


Out of Time

by NerdWhoSaysNi



Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Action, Action/Adventure, Ballet, F/M, France (Country), Helicarrier (Marvel), New York City, Paris (City), Romance, SHIELD, Trust, Truth, Undercover Missions, Washington D.C.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-30
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-07-04 09:36:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 25
Words: 50,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15838578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NerdWhoSaysNi/pseuds/NerdWhoSaysNi
Summary: Steve Rogers has only had a short time to warm up to this new world and new life, and already he's battled aliens, gods, and monsters. After the fight against the Chitauri in NYC, Steve resigns himself to a life of technology and the unknown. He yearns for the simplicity of the forties. To take his mind off everything, he works tirelessly on every mission Fury hands him. When Steve gets sent to Paris, he faces new challenges and old demons alike. The deeper into the mission he gets, the more he realizes that this new world is never what he expects and nothing he could be prepared for. He really is a man out of time.Author's Note: I wrote this story on Wattpad originally after the first Avengers movie but before CATWS. It was published under the title "La Petite Fleur", but to avoid confusion since the story is written in English, I have retitled it here.





	1. Set

Steve pulled his bomber jacket closer around his torso and crossed his arms. His eyes drooped from lack of sleep, but try as he might, his brain wouldn't rest. It revolved and writhed over the file resting beside him- the file he'd read three times already. Every detail from every page swirled across his mind's eye as he stared at a point on the floor, not really seeing it, but seeing through it.

He rested his head back against the smooth metal of the Quinjet interior. The flight had been lengthy and turbulent but nothing he hadn't experienced before. The war had prepared him for things much worse than unpleasant flights. The image of Bucky falling from the train and down into the icy crevasse replayed itself over again as it had so many times before. The event he'd been least prepared for. The event that had unsettled him the most. Steve shook his head to clear the image of Bucky's terrified face. Not now, he told himself. He needed to focus.

"Captain Rogers?" The pilot's voice snapped him out of the nightmare and back to a nightmare of a different kind. "We're preparing for descent."

Steve nodded and stood, replacing the file into a backpack. He felt the Quinjet land and slung the backpack over his shoulder. As the pilot lowered the ramp, Steve reached under his seat to retrieve the duffel he'd stowed there for the flight. Walking off the ramp, he slung the duffel over his shoulder as well and set foot to the lush turf.

The sky above was covered by a blanket of charcoal grey clouds, hiding any stars that might have been seen above Paris. In the distance, the Eiffel Tower grazed the sky and stood watch over the quaint city. A gentle breeze ruffled his hair and brought with it the aroma of freshly baked bread. As the Quinjet took off again, Steve glanced at his watch; he'd already set it to Paris time so he was confused for a second when it read 4am.

He took a deep inhale of the night air before starting towards the address Fury had given him the previous day. The Director had told him that he would be staying in a small apartment in the city, walking distance from everywhere he might need to go. It wasn't far and Steve soon reached the front door. Classical music and voices conversing in rapid French seeped out a partially open window across the street. He stepped inside and locked the door behind himself.

A kitchen to his left was equipped with a stove, microwave, other essentials, and a small table that could comfortably fit two. No door separated the kitchen from the entryway in which he now stood. The entryway extended to a small hallway straight in front of him. Two doors to the right and one to the left that he assumed would be a bathroom and two bedrooms. To his right, the entryway opened to a living room with a sofa, coffee table, and radio and two windows facing the street, one facing the side.

He smiled; it was cozy. Just large enough for living in with no wasted space. He slid one of the living room windows open a couple inches and let the cool breeze swirl through the stale air of the apartment. He stepped down the hallway and opened the first door on the right. It revealed a bathroom just as he'd expected. The next door on the right revealed a closet already housing a broom, mop, towels and linens, and cleaning supplies.

That leaves this door, he thought as he turned the knob to the door on the left. And sure enough, the door swung aside to reveal a bedroom. Two windows across from the door allowed the orange glow of streetlights to fall onto a plain mattress. A medium sized dresser sat against the wall beside the bed and left plenty of walking space.

It was already so late that he didn't bother to sleep in the bedroom tonight and instead collapsed on the couch in the living room after getting a pillow out of the linen closet. He laid his bomber jacket over the back of the sofa and stretched out. He kicked off his shoes and pulled out the file again. Not that he needed to read it a fourth time, just that he felt more comfortable doing so. As an afterthought, he also unzipped his duffel and slid the shield out of its confines.

The brightly painted vibranium was a familiar sight, comforting and unsettling at the same time. It was one of the only things that had survived the crash into the frozen sea with him. After the battle of New York, it had been repainted so the scorch marks and nicks were erased. It looked new, fresh, like a hopeful rookie soldier having no idea what he was walking into. Steve's tired mind was sent reeling back to when he'd first acquired the shield in '43. Those five shots of anger Peggy had loosed on him when he'd asked what she thought.

Peggy.

Not a day went by without something that brought back a torrent of memories like a river swollen by spring floods. Most of those memories centered on Peggy. He sighed deeply, feeling all over again the pain he'd felt when the time he'd spent in the ice was finally explained to him. When it finally sank in that Peggy would have thought he was dead. His first reaction was to try to find her. And he did. With SHIELD's resources, he'd found her address and phone number, but he'd chickened out. He couldn't do it. After all these years, she must have learned to live without him in peace and if she found out he was alive... He didn't want to do that to her.

Steve read through the folder a fourth time without really reading it. His mind was absorbed in memories. Come on, Rogers, he told himself, Get with it. You have a mission to complete. He read through the file a fifth time, starting a sixth time but his eyes closed and he drifted off to sleep.


	2. Commence

Steve opened his eyes the next day, confused as to why he was lying on the floor. With a groan, he pushed his face away from the hardwood floors, forgetting about the close proximity with the coffee table, and felt the back of his head crunch against the wooden edge. Stunned, he fell back to the floor for a second, skull throbbing. With a moan of pain, he pushed off the floor again and sat himself heavily onto the sofa. He rubbed his head gingerly before pulling the pillow off the floor as well and holding it to the lump forming at the back of his head.

He rested for a few minutes until the throbbing subsided before slowly getting to his feet and heading to the bathroom. He bent over the sink and splashed his face with handfuls of cold water until it ran down his forearms and dripped from his elbows to the tile floor. He turned in the mirror to feel the growing tennis ball sized lump when he got a glimpse of his watch. Almost noon. He was going to be late.

He raced out of the bathroom and grabbed a fresh change of clothes from his duffel before sprinting back and changing. He washed up before hurrying into the living room and grabbing his basic phone (that Natasha had taught him to use), a page from the file, his Swiss Army knife, and his keys. He had taken a step outside the door before jogging back and grabbing his bomber jacket.

Once outside, he locked the door and pulled his arms through the jacket sleeves. The spring air still had enough bite to bring goosebumps to his forearms, but the sun was warm and cheery. Unlike the previous night, the sky was free of clouds and was a pale shade of chalky blue. He glanced at the page in his hands to find the address before starting the short walk. As he walked, he folded the page and stuck it in his jacket pocket along with his knife, phone, and keys.

The sidewalk was filled with the sounds and smells of Paris with out much traffic. As he passed other people on their various paths, some smiled or inclined their heads. A few even greeted him in French, and he would return a smile even if he didn't know what they were saying. A cluster of young children ran by laughing and brandishing play swords at one another. If only war really was that easy, he thought. Sooner than he would have wished, Steve reached his destination and stepped inside.

Bright sunlight streamed through the grand windows lining the side walls, the pale ceiling vaulted away high above his head and made the chamber feel much larger than it must have been. The floor under his feet had seen better years but was in such commendable care that the dark wood still shone and not a board creaked. Rows of seats filed one after the other down to an orchestra pit and stage beyond, mostly hidden by heavy purple curtains with golden tassel ties as large as himself. The stage was built from wood, darkened by stain and age and polished by use. A balcony stretched the length of the three walls unoccupied by the stage, and above the balcony was a booth that sported large lights and speakers.

Steve let his feet carry him to a seat in the balcony to watch the proceeds on stage. Even though he was relatively far back, his view of the stage was incredible. It was elevated about seven or eight feet above the main floor and well illuminated by the sunlight and stage lights above it.

As he watched, the purple curtains were drawn back and a herd of thirty or so young women filed into the front row of seats. They chattered among themselves in what Steve assumed was French since no familiar words reached his ears. One by one, they finished what they were doing at the seats and ascended a set of steps to the stage. The youngest of them looked to be about seventeen and the oldest might have been twenty-six. They were all dressed in black leotards and a few had chosen to wear paper thin black tutus. All wore the same pale pink tights and colorful dyed pointe shoes.

An older woman, maybe late fifties, with a tight graying bun at the back of her head stood before the girls and began to lecture them in French. The dancers responded and fled like butterflies to their places, beginning a specific routine. Twirls and leaps, pirouettes and pointe shoes filled the next hour. At times, the dancers appeared to flutter delicately across the stage and at other times, they would gracefully sprint across the stage with only a small skip-hop at the end. The whole thing might have told a story had there been music or costumes, but sadly, those were lacking today.

Steve got comfortable to watch, crossing his arms and training his eyes on the dancers. After two more hours of watching the young women, the teacher called them to a line once again and began to lecture like before. And again, he understood none of it. The sound of the language was pleasant to his ears and seemed to lilt and twirl in its own way, just as the dancers on stage had done moments before. The teacher ended her lecture abruptly with a quick clap of her hands together and the whole routine was begun again. This time, she would stop particular dancers as they floated across the stage and correct posture, movements, timing, anything minuscule that her trained eyes could detect.

After another two and a half hours, half the girls were dismissed from the rehearsal. They were the dancers with less important roles; the dancers who added mood or emotion, filled spots when there needed to be a filler. In another half hour, more were dismissed and only ten girls remained. Again the teacher spoke to the young women before running through particular spots of the performance again.

At the end of the three and a half hour mark, nine of the girls sat to watch the last dancer run through what appeared would be a solo routine. The dancer seemed to be the average age of the group, maybe twenty or so, and danced better than many of them. Her movements were seamless and fluid and she made few mistakes. From what Steve knew of ballet, she had made no mistakes but the teacher would always stop the girl and point something out before having her run through a portion of the solo again.

When it was nearing 7pm, the teacher announced, " _C'est fini. Je vous laisse_." Immediately, the young women began to chatter noisily among themselves as they gathered their things and flooded toward the doors at the front. Steve descended the stairs from the balcony and slid out to the atrium before the dancers could block the doorway. Instead of heading straight outside, they headed into a closed room that quickly filled with giggles and laughter.

When the ten girls emerged again, they had changed into more acceptable street clothes, though many had opted to remain in their short black tutus. Step one of the mission started here and now, he reminded himself. He stepped up to the girls as they headed to leave, causing them to pause and look him over, some with curiosity, some with annoyance.

"Excuse me, I'm looking for someone," Steve said. He stepped forward to get their attention better and tried to speak to just one, but they tittered and shifted among themselves and it was hard for him to focus on just one. "Is one of you Antoinette Cousteau?"

The dancers chittered among themselves, some casting him uneasy glances before one girl with black hair spoke up. " _Oui_. We know 'er. Why are you looking for 'er?" Her accent wasn't quite French but still sounded familiar. German maybe? Russian?

Another girl with blonde hair that he recognized as the solo dancer spoke from the other side of the cluster. " _C'est bien_ , Diana," she said to the first speaker. This girl's accent was French through and through but not a deep sort of throaty accent he'd heard from passersby in the city. It was a light, airy sort of accent that made the language seem that much more beautiful. "I am Antoinette. Why are you looking for me?"

"I need to speak with you," he told her, nervous that he might actually fail the first and easiest step.

" 'ow long?" the girl replied, shifting the weight of a backpack higher onto her shoulder. Her pale blue eyes cast skeptical glances over his face as he stammered a reply.

"Not long. Just, uh, fifteen minutes," he answered. He was doing his best to approach the situation as a soldier, but surrounded by these girls, he felt more like the shy recruit sitting in the backseat of a cab beside Peggy.

" _Non_. I cannot," she said, shaking her head. "I have things to attend to."

"Can it wait? This is important," he insisted, hoping that she would agree.

" _Je suis désolée mais non_. I am sorry but no." She took a step toward the door and Steve knew he had lost. If he couldn't do it now, tomorrow would be his last chance. If he didn't pester her now, she might talk with him next time. He nodded slowly, accepting her decision.

The dancers began to giggle and talk with each other as they left the theatre, Antoinette being the last through the door. Two steps down the sidewalk, she hesitated and looked back at Steve. Her eyes were narrowed in suspicion, wariness written in every inch of the way she stood. He tipped his head to her in a parting nod and started in the opposite direction.

"Antoinette,  _allons-y_!" one of the girls called to her companion.

" _Je vais suivre_ ," he heard her answer.

Steve heard soft but quick footfalls chase after him. The next thing he knew, the petite blonde dancer stood beside him. The top of her bun barely reached past his shoulder at the highest and she walked on her toes slightly. She couldn't have been any more than five foot two, if she was even that tall. Since she had to walk quickly to keep up with him, he stopped and turned to face her.

"Do I know you?" she asked him.

Steve shook his head. "I don't believe so."

"Then 'ow do you know me?"

It was a valid question. "I'm here on behalf of SHIELD."

She immediately bristled at the mention of SHIELD. " _Non_! I will do  _rien_ for Directeur Fury! _Il est un menteur et un lâche! J'étais libre de lui et de son organization horrible jusqu'à maintenant et je refuse d'être traîné en arrière! Vous pouvez dire le Directeur à_ -" She began to rant at him in French until he held up a hand to stop her.

"Hey! I have no idea what you're saying so you can stop wasting your breath. I'd rather keep this in English if you don't mind," he told her.

She rolled her eyes in exasperation before lowering her voice and hissing, "Tell your  _Directeur_  that 'e does not own me. I will do as I wish and 'e cannot stop it." She huffed angrily before turning on the heel of her hightops and marching briskly away.

Steve stood rooted to the spot, dumbstruck. He couldn't move, only stared after Antoinette and two dancers who had stayed back to wait for her as they disappeared around a corner.

On his way back to his apartment, Steve stopped at a corner cafe for dinner. The food was good, nothing like a real slice of Brooklyn pizza of course, but still good. When he reached the apartment, the quiet sounds of the previous night had been replaced with the ecstatic screams of children playing across the street, car horns in the distance, and voices all over the street conversing in French.

Before he could close the door behind himself, a rubber ball roughly the size of a softball bounced off the doorframe and narrowly missed his face. "Whoa!" he exclaimed, ducking just in time.

He stepped away from the door, leaving it ajar, and found the ball under the sofa. He fetched it out and carried it back to the door where three boys, all probably under the age of nine, stood with nervous expressions. He handed it back to the smallest of the three with a smile. The boy still looked terrified.

"Jean! Jerome!" a sharp voice called from across the street. The two older boys turned so fast, Steve was afraid they'd fall off the steps. A woman he assumed was their mother was bustling across the street with a wooden spoon brandished in her hand. The two older boys- Jean and Jerome, he guessed- hurried off the steps and reached for their younger brother. They were too slow and soon their mother had reached Steve's front steps.

She began to scold them in French, brandishing that wooden spoon in a way that sharply reminded Steve of his own mother. "Ma'am," he started before wondering if she spoke English at all. "It's alright. They didn't do any harm."

The woman straightened up, letting the wooden spoon fall to her side. "You are sure? Iz not first time zis 'as 'appened. I am sorry zey bothered you. Will not 'appen again.  _Garçons_?" The three boys were quick to nod. The youngest of the three was still watching Steve with wide, green eyes.

"They're not a bother at all. If it's alright, they can play here whenever they want. I don't mind," he insisted.

"Not at all?" she wondered, looking confused as to why a stranger didn't mind her boys running wild near his house. Steve shook his head with an amused smile. One of the older boys turned excited eyes to his mother while the youngest let a grin break across his face that revealed the gap from a recently lost tooth.

" _Bon, garçons_ , but you must respect 'im and whatever 'e tells you." They all nodded eagerly. " _Merci_ ," their mother told Steve before casting one last look to her boys that clearly said 'behave' and heading back to a house across the street.

As soon as their mother had disappeared inside their house, the three boys began to beg Steve to play with them. He agreed, and they dragged him down the steps to the street with whoops of happiness. In broken English, the boy he learned was Jean, the oldest at a grand age of eight and a half- "and don't forget ze 'alf!"- began to teach him a game they had made up together. Jerome, the second oldest at the age of "almost seven" kept reminding his brother of parts of the game that he found more important than whatever part his brother was talking about. The youngest brother, Jason, remained silent the entire time his brothers chattered on.

Steve played with the three boys until night fell and they could no longer see where the ball was going when they passed it. Just as he was rounding up the boys to send them back to their mother, her voice called across the street toward them. " _Garçons_ ,  _venez ici_!" Jean and Jerome went running home, waving to Steve and calling Jason after them.

Before he left, Jason tugged on Steve's jacket sleeve and asked, "Are you Captain of the America?"

"Why do you think that?" Steve asked, curious where this boy's suspicions were from.

"You look like 'im." The boy answered with the innocent simplicity all children seemed to possess.

"I do, huh? Well, what would you say if I was Captain America?" he answered.

Jason's mouth fell open and his eyes widened to the size of half dollars. "Are you?" he whispered.

Steve chuckled and ruffled the boy's curly brown hair. "I might be someday. For now I'm just me."

"Oh," the boy replied, not looking disappointed at all.

"It's getting late and your mother's waiting. Go ahead home," Steve told him, standing up.

Jason nodded, beginning to jog home before stopping and calling back, " _Bon nuit,_ " with a small wave. The door closed behind the boy and the night was quiet once again.

Steve stepped into his apartment and closed the door, a smile lingering on his face. He emptied his pockets at the kitchen counter and poured a glass of water before taking his things to the bedroom and making up the bed with sheets and a comforter he found in the linen closet. He read through a particular page of the file again before falling into bed and dropping off to sleep.


	3. Act I

Steve woke up the next morning to sunlight streaming in his window. For the second time, it took him a moment to remember where he was. Nightmare of all nightmares, he'd thought he was in the SHIELD room again where he'd been placed after they thawed him out. He was supposed to have been 'gently worked into the new world' but that had ended abruptly when he'd gone charging into the middle of Times Square. Fury had asked him if anything was wrong; stupid question- of course something was wrong! He'd been MIA for seventy years, yeah, he would've thought that counted as  _wrong_.

But the only thing that had really bothered him was missing his date with Peggy. He could picture her crestfallen expression whenever she thought of the Stork Club; he could see her reluctant to dance again for a while after the war. It hadn't mattered to her if he couldn't dance, she would have taught him how. An image materialized unbidden to his mind of Peggy's smiling grimace after he had stepped on her foot for the tenth time. Something that would most likely have happened had he not put the plane in the ice. But it was his only option at the time; he couldn't have waited for the SSR to help, it would've blown. Wouldn't it? What might have happened had he not put the plane in the ice? He would've gone dancing with Peggy, that was what would have happened. Other than that...

 _No_ , he told himself.  _Snap out of it, Rogers, it doesn't do well to bode on the past._

He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and yawned, stretching his arms over his head before getting to his feet. After a few minutes of fiddling with the knobs and plugs, he figured out how to work the shower. When he finished, he made his way to the kitchen and found breakfast in the cupboards in the form of cereal. The coffee maker was too complex to figure out now so he settled to go without and was soon heading out the door.

Today was much warmer than the previous day, the sun beating down from a cloudless sky. There was no breeze as he walked toward the designated address, but voices still carried through the stagnant air toward him. Somewhere off to the right side of the city, sirens wailed before fading away, out of his hearing range.

The people here, he noticed, were friendly and always seemed in a good mood. Except Antoinette. He'd already spoiled his first attempt and after today, there would be no other chances. Either she agreed today, or- He didn't want to think about the alternative.

As he rounded the final corner and began down the stretch of sidewalk toward the theater, he heard a familiar voice call out behind him, " _Monsieur Steven!_ " Steve turned to see Jerome and Jason running over to him. Their mother and Jean were close behind but Jean had just broken into a run to catch his younger brothers. Steve laughed as they began to tell him about their morning out doing chores with their mother. Each tried to talk over the others and it became a battle to see who could capture the most of Steve's attention, though he was trying his best to give them all an equal portion while they bombarded him.

" _Garçons_!  _Un à la fois. Tu ne vois pas qu'il est débordé_?" their mother scolded. Immediately, the three boys backed off and quieted. " _Maintenant_ , if 'e 'as no where 'e needs to be, you may tell 'im," she continued, asking it as a question to Steve himself.

"I am headed somewhere, Ma'am, but it's not urgent. I have time," he answered.

The boys began to bounce with eagerness to tell him their stories. One at a time they each told their own story of how their morning had gone, making Sunday chores sound like a great adventure. When it was time for them to leave, Jason again was last to obey the command. The young boy tugged on Steve's sleeve to bring him down to his own level and Steve obeyed. "Are you sure you're not  _le_   _Captain_?"

Steve chuckled.  _This kid never gives up_ , he thought. "I'm sure."

"Can you be?" Jason asked, wide eyed.

"Maybe someday," he answered.

"Tomorrow?"

"Probably not tomorrow. Now run along, your mother's waiting." Steve stood and watched the three boys and their mother round the corner out of sight.

He continued down the sidewalk to the theater and stepped inside. From the stage, music and voices floated on the still air toward him. The dancers from the previous day were already on stage and running through the routine. He took his seat in the balcony and watched as they leapt and twirled, flitting delicately across the polished floor.

After several hours, the girls were packing up to leave once again. Steve let them get to the atrium first, and just as he'd expected, they turned into the changing room before leaving the building. Today, instead of leaving in a large massed huddle, they trickled out one by one. He leaned against a wall to wait for Antoinette and ignored the glares he received from the other girls.

When she finally emerged, she was among the last three to leave. At first she didn't see him and left with the others, chattering in excited French. He followed them at a length until Antoinette stopped at an intersection and the other two continued straight, leaving her alone on the street. She pushed the button and waited for traffic to pause before she could walk across the busy intersection.

As she turned to look at the traffic to see how long she would have to wait, she caught a glimpse of Steve and her already pale blue eyes took on an icy quality. She spat, "Can you not leave me alone?  _S'en_   _aller_! Go away!"

"Not an option," he answered, taking the last few steps to stand a few feet from her. He didn't dare get any closer. The glare she was giving him sent a shiver down his spine as if someone had slipped an ice cube down the back collar of his shirt.

"Not an option?" she repeated. "And why would that be?"

"Because I need to talk with you." He kept his voice level and casual, hoping she wouldn't begin ranting at him again. "I'm assuming you heard about the battle in New York?" he asked.

" _Oui_ , yes, of course. Why?"

"Well, I was told you knew Agent Coulson. He was killed in the events leading up to the battle. Loki, the Asgardian, killed him."

He could tell from her expression that she didn't believe him. " _Vous_   _mentez_. You are lying."

"No, sadly I'm not. I'm sorry," he said.

" 'e is not dead. 'e can't be," she replied, her icy shell cracking around the edges and exposing a flustered interior. "You are lying," she repeated. "There is no way. 'e could not 'ave." She began to take a step backwards into the oncoming traffic, unaware of the curb drop off behind her. In a flash, Steve caught her elbow and righted her again safely on the sidewalk.

"Leave me alone!" She wrenched her elbow angrily from his grasp and cast a look toward the walk signal sign. In her haste to get away from Steve, she hadn't seen the glare across the signal, and didn't realize that the signal had not switched to walk. She started off the sidewalk with the momentum from wresting herself from his grip and used the momentum to carry herself into a jog.

A car horn split the air and time seemed to slow. Tossing regard for personal safety to the wind, Steve sprinted out into traffic, feeling as if he were running through honey. The car had hit the brakes, letting out an ear-piercing screech, but it wouldn't be able to stop in time. Antoinette had frozen, feet scrambling to carry her backwards and away from harm but fear holding her in place.

At last he reached her and grabbed her around the waist, frantically reversing his motion and throwing them both back to the sidewalk and to safety. He landed heavily on his back, the air knocked from his lungs, but Antoinette at least was safe. She had landed on top of him for the most part, but he could tell from the way she landed that her arm had been scraped. Sure enough, when he sat up and managed to regain his breath, her left arm and shoulder had been razzed and was beginning to bleed.

She pushed herself slowly to her hands and knees but stopped. Immediately, Steve became more concerned that she'd taken the fall harder than he thought. She was a lot smaller than him so he couldn't be sure.

He waited to see if she would move on her own before placing a light hand on her shoulder. No response. Before he could say anything, she began to shake hard enough that he could not only feel the tremors, but see them as well. "Antoinette?" he said, trying to get her attention.

Still no response. "Antoinette? Are you all right?" She took so long to reply he wasn't even sure if she'd heard him. After what felt like far too long a pause, she shook her head. The shaking was becoming steadily worse. From the way she was positioned, he couldn't see her face clearly but what he could see of her expression told him more than a verbal answer ever could.

"Come on," he told her, keeping his voice steady and quiet. "Can you stand?" She answered by pulling her feet beneath her body and clinging to the traffic light pole for a crutch. Slowly, she rose to her feet, leaning heavily on the pole.

"Are you hurt?" he asked, still keeping his tone low and calming. She shook her head so slightly he could've imagined it. "Do you think you can walk?" he asked. She hesitated before nodding. Even when she was scared out of her wits, she managed to find a way to make things difficult for him. "Try taking a few steps. Just try," he told her, urging some movement.

Reluctant to part with her crutch, she took a step with one hand still clinging to the smooth metal. The next step, she let her fingers slide away and dropped the hand to her side. She took a few more steps before shakily bending over to grab her backpack. "I'll take that for you if you like?" he offered. The look she shot him said enough. He took a step back and held his hands up in surrender.

She shouldered the bag and gingerly started down the street, not casting him a second glance. Steve gave her a few steps before catching up and walking beside her, close enough to catch her if she happened to fall but far enough that she couldn't slip a knife in his ribs.

The next time they came to a street crossing, Antoinette paused before speed walking across the street. Steve followed after her, keeping a sharp eye both ways for oncoming traffic. They walked in silence toward a quieter portion of the city where the majority of traffic was bicycles and pedestrians.

It was mid afternoon and the early spring sun warmed the cozy streets, bathing children playing nearby in a yellow glow. Steve noticed how the wrought iron railings and glass windows reflected the sunshine and made things much brighter than they really were. It also gave the scene a warmer appearance though the temperature couldn't have been above fifty-or-so degrees Fahrenheit. He nonchalantly stuck his hands in his pockets and tipped his head back to enjoy the warm sun on his face.

Just as he was beginning to enjoy the walk, Antoinette rounded on him. "Why are you following me?" Her tone was accusatory and suspicious.

"It's my job," he answered simply.

"Why?"

"Director told me to. Do I need another reason?"

" _Oui_ , why?" She'd taken a step toward him, the ice returning to her gaze.

"I was sent to make sure you didn't do anything stupid and get yourself killed," he answered, starting to feel defensive.

"And why would I do anything like that?" she asked, spitting sharp consonants at him.

"Because you know too much, so I was told."

Her countenance changed immediately, eyes widening in surprise and lips parting slightly. He'd startled her, he realized. She covered the distance between them and rose to tiptoe to stand about level with his chin. When she spoke, every word was saturated in venom, "Stay away from me. Stay away from the  _theâtre_ and stay away from other people's business. I am going to leave and if you know what's good for you, you won't follow.  _Maintenant, bon débarras avec vous_. Good riddance with you."

With that, she turned heel and continued on her way down the sidewalk. Steve stood and watched her go, waiting until she'd rounded the corner before turning back.

As he retraced their steps, he thought over what had happened. She hadn't exactly agreed to his protection but she hadn't forbidden it either. Except that last part about staying away from her. Slight road bump. He rubbed the back of his neck in mild frustration as he waited to cross a street. If he was sent to protect her, he couldn't exactly stay away.

When the light changed, he hurried across traffic and quickened his pace. As he rounded the street to his apartment, the sun was just dipping below the rooftops, leaving long, grey shadows on the sidewalk. Picturesque orange light reflected off window panes and highlighted the cheery yellow flowers in their boxes on a neighbor's doorstep.

The scene as a whole reminded him of Brooklyn when he was a kid, just with less car honking and better smells. He smiled, remembering a Brooklyn untouched by the War and untouched by modern filth and technology. With sudden longing, he found himself desperately homesick. Not for New York or the Burroughs as they were today, but for the city he'd grown up in, the city he'd loved.

He unlocked his apartment with a sigh and stepped in, opening a window in the living room and pulling out the file again. He sat on the couch to study the familiar wording. Antoinette Giselle Cousteau; age 20; former SHIELD spy; undercover ballet circuit dancer. Everything he already knew. But something was missing. The pieces weren't fitting together.

He spread the six sheets of paper over the coffee table in front of him and leaned his elbows on his knees. What was missing? As he read through the text again, he tried to find where there might be gaps. Well, what he found wasn't much. What did she know that was so dangerous? Who wanted her killed?

Then, like a clock beginning to work, the cogs fell together in his brain and the pieces clicked. She'd backed out of SHIELD for some reason or another but  _why_? Knowing that would help immensely. There was nothing in the file about her childhood until the age of fifteen when she'd joined SHIELD; and everything else in her file had to do with what she did for SHIELD while she was still with them. As he read through the papers over again until his eyes were dry and his thoughts were muddled, still the question lingered: why?


	4. Preuve

Steve sat up with a start, having fallen asleep on the couch again. He wasn't sure what time of day it was because the windows revealed a storm pounding the street outside. The sky was dark and the angry clouds lay low over the city. Rain poured off roofs and filled gutters, overflowing into drains and grates in the paving. Dirty rivulets of fast moving runoff chased each other down the street and around bends until they reached the finish line at the drainage grates.

He sat up and rubbed the shrinking lump on the back of his head, still bruised from its collision with the coffee table. He yawned and in doing so, caught a look at his watch. Only 6:30am, he thought. Looked far too dreary to be a spring morning, but Paris was different from New York; he had to remember that.

As he got ready for the morning's tasks, he ran through the file in his mind. He would have to find the answers to his questions before he could continue too far into the mission. He was in the process of making the bed when he stopped suddenly. Why did Fury even want this girl protected if she wasn't part of SHIELD anymore? From what he could gather, the 'too much' that she knew didn't have to do with SHIELD. So who considered her enough of a threat to hunt her down? And when would they reach her?

He finished the morning's chores and turned on the radio for some noise as he sat to think. Most of the stations broadcasted in French but a few fuzzy stations came through in English. He wasn't really paying the announcer any attention until he heard something that ripped his thoughts away from their previous work. "...including a solo performance from Mademoiselle Cousteau. The matinée will be held at one in the afternoon two weeks from today at the theater on..."

Steve didn't have to hear where it would be held; he already knew. At least now he knew he had about two weeks to persuade Antoinette he was telling the truth. The performance would be the perfect time to take her out. In the backstage chaos, it wouldn't be hard to poison her or lure her away for an ambush. And during her solo, she'd be an easy sniper target. Two weeks. He had two weeks. Sounded easy enough, but talking to this girl was like trying to deactivate a bomb. The slightest wrong move made her blow up.

The clock rolled around to eight and the clouds began to clear. A chalky blue sky was almost entirely freed of clouds, and what few remained were fluffy and white. The puddles in the sidewalks reflected the peaceful sky. The steady  _drip drip_ of water leaving gutters accompanied his footsteps as he began his walk toward the theater once again.

The air was warm and humid, but the breeze cut like a newly sharpened kitchen knife. He pulled his bomber jacket closer around his body as he walked. When he passed a cafe, he remembered he hadn't had breakfast at the apartment. The tempting aromas of hot coffee and fresh bakery creations were enough to lure him toward the neatly arranged open-air tables.

Maybe twenty people sat intermittently among the tables in twos or threes and few sat alone. He cast his eyes over the tables to find a seat when his gaze landed on the last person he had expected. Thinking quickly, he strode over and slid into the empty seat across the table.

Antoinette's head was down, reading what looked to be a page of the newspaper when Steve slid in across from her. Without looking up, she said, "I'll give you thirty seconds to find a different table or leave the café entirely."

"Good morning to you too," he retorted.

"Twenty seconds," she answered, refusing to face him.

"I'm not leaving, however nice that offer may sound," Steve replied, pulling his hands from his pockets and crossing his arms.

"I wasn't offering. I was demanding that you leave me alone."

"I can't do that," he said, watching her posture stiffen every time he denied her.

"And why not?"

"Because you're in danger."

"I am always in danger. We live in a world of danger. If you intend to frighten me, you'll 'ave to do better," she answered.

"Someone wants to have you killed for something you know. What do you know that's so important?"

She propped her elbows on the table and leaned part way across the table toward him. "Oh, but if I told you that, they'd 'ave to kill you too. Hm, maybe I should tell you. Then when they killed you, I'd be free of you at last."

Steve resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Do you know who they are that want you killed?"

"I might," she answered sitting back in her chair.

"But you won't tell me." Steve sat back as well, noticing a waitress heading for their table.

" _Exactement_ ," Antoinette answered with a small smirk.

The waitress arrived at their table and turned to Antoinette first to take her order. They spoke in quick French to each other before the waitress scrawled something on her notepad and turned to Steve.

"Black coffee, hot?" he asked, wondering if she spoke English. When she simply continued to stare at him, he assumed she didn't understand. He looked to Antoinette for help.

She smiled a little in pitying amusement before telling the waitress his order in French. The waitress replied to Antoinette, " _Americain_?"

Antoinette seemed amused. " _Oui._ "

The woman nodded and left them alone at the table once more.

"So, I believe you were leaving?" she said.

"No, I'm pretty sure I was staying," he retorted.

"Fine. Stay," she answered with a shrug.

The waitress returned with their drinks and Steve thanked the waitress with a smile and dip of his head. He blew on his coffee before taking a swallow. It wasn't the usual drip brew he was used to. It was nutty and strong, but he liked it.

Antoinette simply glared at him from across the table. Those piercing blue eyes seemed to stare inside his being, search out everything he was thinking, and turn him inside out like a sock.

"Who are you?" she asked at length.

He would be honest with her, to an extent. If she wasn't going to be open with him, there was no reason he should tell her everything up front. Just enough for her to trust him. "I'm a member of SHIELD, what else do you need to know?"

" _Non_ , I know that already."

"Then what do you want to know?" he asked calmly.

"I want to know who you are, where you are from, and most importantly- why you are doing this," she told him, once again leaning toward him across the table. She held her little espresso cup with both hands, her fingers elegantly extended and yet relaxed, the trait of a ballet dancer if ever he had seen one. Who knew it was possible to make holding a teacup graceful?

"I told you who I am. Where I'm from is complicated and quite irrelevant. As to why I'm doing this- I was asked to."

"And you just do as you are told without a single question asked?"

"Well, yes, kind of."

"I cannot  _believe_ you  _Américains_!" she said, slamming the flat palms of her hands on the table at the word 'believe' and pushing herself back in her chair.

A gunshot rang through the air and the wooden table between them was splintered by a bullet at the precise spot where her face had been moments before. Her jaw hung open slightly and her eyes widened in surprise. Immediately, Steve leapt into action; he overturned the table so it could act as a barrier for them. Frozen in shock, Antoinette stood beside the table, looking entirely dumbfounded. He grabbed her arm just above the elbow and pulled her down behind the table.

The customers in the cafe created general chaos as they screamed and bolted for the exit. Another bullet glanced off the top edge of the table and ricocheted against the wrought iron fence they'd been sitting beside. As Antoinette's head popped up to see where the bullet had come from, another gunshot rang out. By instinct, he pushed her head down with a command of "Stay low!" She nodded, not questioning his judgement.

As she cowered willingly behind the table, Steve stood and looked around. Two men he didn't recognize were sprinting toward the spot where he stood, shoving their way through the crowd and mass mayhem. He stepped forward and intercepted the first man, landing an easy hit to the man's gut before slinging him against the iron fence railing. The man's body slid limply to the ground. The second man was a tougher opponent. He countered Steve's first hit and returned with several punches of his own, leaving Steve with a bloody nose before he could knock the man unconscious.

As he turned to grab Antoinette so they could run for it, he heard a muffled gasp and scooped the second assailant's gun off the ground. By muscle memory, he had it pointed at exactly the right spot when he had faced his target fully. A third man was holding Antoinette at gunpoint, the hand with the gun pressed to her temple, the free hand holding her arms tightly by her sides.

"Whoa. Hold on," he said, slowly lowering his gun. The man pointed his gun at Steve, and lightning quick, Steve brought his gun back up. "Let her go, and I won't shoot," he said, trying to keep his voice level.

"Ah," the man sneered. "You're out of time, soldier. She's ours now." His gruff voice carried an accent Steve didn't recognize.

"The last person to tell me I was out of time ended up sitting in a cage 30,000 feet in the air for two days."

"But that wasn't your doing, soldier. I know," the man answered, beginning to slowly take a step backwards. "Put the gun down and walk away and maybe we'll spare the girl."

Steve nodded, slowly bending to the ground and setting the gun in the grass. As he stood, he slipped his Swiss Army knife out of his pocket and switched it to his right hand. He'd never been any good at throwing knives, but he would have to do it. He had one shot.

Before the man could react, Steve brought the knife up and threw it, praying that Antoinette would know enough to duck. The knife embedded itself in the man's neck. He shoved Antoinette away from himself and ripped the blade from his flesh. As she hit the ground, he pointed his gun at her once more.

Steve's training took over and he snatched a platter from the ground without thinking. It was nothing like his shield but it would have to do. Before the the man could pull the trigger, Steve threw the platter, knocking the gun from the man's hand. The attacker had no time to recover himself before Steve sent him to unconsciousness.

For a short moment, nothing moved. Steve could hear his heart pounding a rapid beat in his chest. He spun to look for Antoinette, finding her still in the grass, watching him with wide eyes. "Are you okay?" he asked.

She nodded weakly, appearing on the verge of tears. He opened his mouth to ask another question when the shriek of sirens split the mid morning air. With sirens came curious people, and with curious people came questions- too many questions. Too many questions and not enough answers. They had to leave.

"Here," he said, offering to help her stand. She accepted his help and rose slowly to her feet. "We have to leave, okay?"

She nodded, following him out of the café and down the street. Without thinking, Steve lead them down the streets of Paris as quickly as he could without looking conspicuous. In less than fifteen minutes, they had escaped the sirens.

Scared that she wouldn't be able to keep up the quick pace for much longer, Steve slowed. They had reached a narrow back road he'd come through his first night in Paris. "Wait," Antoinette said. She was looking around, clearly familiar with where they were. "Can we stop at the  _thêatre_? I 'ave a backpack with some things in it. Fresh clothes and the like. I would feel better 'aving it close." Fresh clothes would be good, he realized; her back and legs were flecked with mud and bits of grass from when she'd been thrown to the ground.

He nodded and she started down a street that made two sharp left turns before turning onto the street with the theatre. She entered the grand building and ducked inside the room the girls used to change after practices. Steve waited in the atrium, keeping a sharp eye out for anything that might be suspicious. An eternity of five minutes later, she left the room. She'd changed into a set of clean clothes and was zipping the backpack shut. "Ready?" he asked.

She nodded and they left the theater. "They would have already checked your apartment and would most likely be watching for when you came back," he said. "And as soon as they can, they'll have men watching the theater as well. Can you think of anywhere you can stay that you don't usually go?"

She shook her head. " _Non_."

"Alright," he answered. "I know where we can go." She nodded and hiked the backpack higher onto her shoulder, waiting for him to lead.

Steve took a longer route than was truly necessary, but if anyone was tailing them, he wanted to know. When he was sure they were free of followers, he traced the familiar path to his apartment. A glance through a window told him that no one had been here. He let Antoinette in first and locked the door behind them.

Immediately, she sank onto the sofa and buried her face in her hands. Steve suddenly felt awkward and clumsy, the same feeling he had had many times before the super soldier transformation. As he was debating what he should do, she lifted her face from her hands and let her backpack slide to the floor. He could almost see her collecting the pieces and putting herself back together like a broken vase that had been knocked off a shelf.

"Thank you," she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

"You're welcome," he answered.

She tipped her head to the side with a puzzled look before saying, "You 'ave never told me your name."

He realized this was true. Not once had he told her his name. He couldn't give her his real name. It would be too easy for her to Google him and find out the whole truth. So he made something up. "Steve Barnes," he replied simply, taking off his jacket and hanging it on a peg in the hallway. 

"So who are you really?" she asked, tone free of suspicion or accusation, simply curious for a truthful answer.

He debated telling her, but thought better of it. "Like I said, I'm a member of SHIELD."

"For 'ow long?"

"Roughly a year."

"What did you do before that?"

"I was a soldier," he answered.

"And the man, he knew that."

He nodded, pulling a chair from the kitchen table into the living room to sit across from her. She kicked off her sandals and pulled her feet onto the couch, tucking her legs up beside her.

"Why did you leave SHIELD?" Steve asked.

"I didn't agree with what they had me doing. I told Fury I wanted a different assignment and 'e refused, so I got a ride with a friend on the next flight off the base," she answered simply.

"How long were you part of SHIELD?"

"Almost four years of active involvement. The rest is complicated."

"Complicated how?" he asked.

"I'd rather not say,  _s'il te plait._ " She looked away from him, casting her eyes to the floor, before undoing her braid and using her fingers to comb her hair out. The soft blonde waves fell to her waist and curled at the ends.

"How did SHIELD find you?" he wondered.

She looked up, making him feel as though she were turning him inside out again. "It is a  _étendu_ \- uh, lengthy- story."

"We've got plenty of time," he replied.

She hesitated so long he wondered if she'd heard him at all. With a sigh, she began her story.


	5. Histoire

"Like I said, it is a long story," Antoinette began. "My parents were agents for SHIELD before they even met. They were sent on a rescue mission together 'ere in Paris and eloped without telling  _Directeur_  Fury. Phil Coulson was the only person they told about it and when I was born, 'e was like my uncle. No one knew about me except 'im. My parents taught me about SHIELD and the missions and technology and everything that went on that normal people 'ad no knowledge of. They even began to train me once I was old enough. They wanted to appear as an average family so they let me do ballet. And I loved it. When I was ten, my parents were killed in action while in Australia." Here she paused. Steve wanted to tell her he was sorry, but she plunged on. As she spoke, her accent thickened.

"Coulson picked me up from ballet and took me 'ome, 'oping to surprise my parents with a visit but zey weren't zere. 'e contacted  _Directeur_  Fury and ze next thing I knew, I was being shipped off to live with a family that 'ad some loose ties to SHIELD. Coulson still visited but..." She trailed away before clearing her throat and starting again. "They were good. They let me continue my training and my ballet. When I was thirteen years, I was asked to join a traveling ballet circuit to spy on a Russian turncoat. At fifteen,  _Directeur_  Fury 'ad me become an agent full time. I ran undercover missions for 'im; missions zat didn't take me far from 'ome and still allowed me time to dance. Then...things got  _différent._ "

"Different how?" he asked.

"Talk of aliens, otherworldly creatures, gods, different kinds of... _existences étranges_." At his blank look she amended, "Strange beings."

"And you backed out?" he asked.

"Not at first. I tried to learn as much as I could. Tried to see if the rumors were real. The more I learned, the stranger things became. The final straw was when Fury wanted to send me to New Mexico."

"Why didn't you go?"

"It was too far from 'ome. I would 'ave 'ad to stop dancing and become a part of SHIELD  _constamment_ , constantly," she answered, pulling her legs closer under her. He nodded, understanding exactly what she meant.

A long pause went by in which neither of them spoke. The wall clock in the kitchen emitted a quiet  _tick tick_  with each stroke of the second hand as it went around. He glanced at his watch and was surprised to see it read half past noon. By now, he was certain Antoinette would be safe at his apartment.

He stood and walked toward the kitchen simply for something to do. "Are you thirsty? Hungry? Anything?" he asked her.

" _Non, merci,_ " she answered.

"You sure?" he asked, fetching a glass down from a cupboard. When he turned, she was standing in the doorway.

She stopped to think before answering, "Tea?" He nodded and brought down a mug as well, setting it on the counter and preparing the hot water. As he searched the cabinets for the tea, he watched her lean against the table and stare out the window. Her thoughts were far away so he decided to not interrupt her until the water pot was whistling. The high pitched cry pulled her out of the trance.

The labels were in French, so he did his best and hoped she would understand. "Noir or  _menthe poivrée_?" he asked.

An amused half-smile crossed her face. " _Le noir_  is black.  _La menthe poivrée_  is peppermint. I will have the peppermint," she answered.

He handed her the fragrant mug and poured himself a glass of water. She took the seat at the table, and he dragged the chair back from the living room before sliding in across from her. The light breeze from the open window beside them stirred the air and brought the mingled scents of peppermint and roses to him.

After several minutes of silence, Antoinette spoke. "There is a rehearsal this evening. It is mandatory. Is it safe if I go?"

Steve thought about it before nodding slowly. It should be alright if he kept an eye out. "Yeah, it should be safe."

Her countenance brightened and he even thought she may have smiled. "Oh  _vraiment_? Really?"

Steve nodded, amused by her sudden excitement. "What time does it start?"

" _Á treize heures_ ," she replied.

"Uh, English please?" he said.

"One o'clock," she repeated.

"Well, it's almost one o'clock now, so we may as well head over. I want to look around too before anything starts."

She popped up from the table and brought her empty mug to the sink before grabbing her backpack from the living room and waiting eagerly by the door. Steve rinsed his glass and dried it before putting it away and following her outside.

They walked side by side until they reached the theater. Giggles and laughter flowed from under the closed door to the left. As Antoinette disappeared to change, Steve scoped out the building.

The outside was constructed of stone blocks about a foot thick with hard cement mortar between each layer. Impenetrable by bullets. The front doors were glass but the doors leading from the atrium to the main auditorium were made of heavy wood, also fairly thick. The doors hiding the stairwells to the balcony were made of the same wood and were approximately the same thickness.

He climbed the right stairwell to the balcony and looked around. If a sniper were to sit up here, they'd have a perfect shot to the stage. There was no place to hide a bomb and even if an explosive was used, it would have to have quite the charge to do any damage to the performers on the stage.

He left the balcony by the stairwell he hadn't used earlier and began his sweep of the main auditorium. The seats were packed closely enough that an attempt at shooting would be useless however close you were; someone was bound to see the gun or be hit accidentally in the process. The tall windows to either side concerned him most: if a well placed shot came through one of them, not only would the shooter have a good chance of hitting his target on stage but also end up raining glass on the bystanders in the seats nearest the outside.

Satisfied, he took a seat in the balcony that allowed him a full view of every other seat in the theater. A few minutes after he sat, the practice began. The dancers filed onto the stage and their instructor began to issue directions. It wasn't hard for Steve to pick Antoinette out of the crowd. She appeared to be the shortest of the group and was gazing around the auditorium to find him.

When she spotted him, he gave her a thumbs up to say that she was safe. She acknowledged it with a small nod before beginning her part in the rehearsal. Steve sat back to watch, letting his gaze move across the seats around and below him now and then. After an hour, he lost track of time, letting himself relax to some extent and watch the show on stage. When it was over, several hours had flown by in a whirl of classical music, leg warmers, and pointe shoes. He descended the stairs to the atrium and waited for Antoinette to change.

Through the double glass doors, he could see a hazy night sky filled with whispy grey clouds that drifted effortlessly past the stars. There were more stars here than in New York but it didn't feel right. He didn't recognize them. He had to remind himself again that however familiar Paris felt, it wasn't home and never would be. Home was the 40's, when everything made sense and he knew what was going on. And even if he finished the mission and found himself in Manhattan again, it still wouldn't be home.

He was startled out of his thoughts by the giggles and conversation of the dancers. Antoinette separated herself from the cluster of girls and stood beside him. "Ready?" he asked. She nodded and they started down the street. The air was humid but the temperature had dropped quite a bit so that goosebumps rose on Antoinette's skin. The thin sweater she'd donned over her even thinner leotard offered minimal protection to the sharp breeze.

"Here," he said, pulling off his bomber jacket and handing it to her.

"I'm fine," she replied. He could tell she was lying from the way she clenched her jaw to keep her teeth from chattering.

"No, you're not." He tried handing her the jacket again. This time she accepted it reluctantly and pulled her arms through the sleeves. The way the sleeves drooped an inch past her fingertips and the hem hung past her hips made the already petite girl look absolutely tiny.

When they'd made it safely back to the apartment, Antoinette kicked off her shoes and curled on the sofa, shedding his bomber jacket and wrapping a white fleece blanket around her shoulders instead. Steve headed to the linen closet and fetched a set of sheets and a blanket before heading back to the living room. As he walked he said, "You can sleep in the bedroom if you'd like and I'll take the couch."

He turned into the living room and smiled to see that Antoinette was already sound asleep on the sofa curled up in the fleece blanket. He pulled a chair into the living room so that he could see every window, the door, and the hallway at once. He was pretty sure no one had followed them here from the theater but he wasn't about to take any chances.

He opened one of the windows several inches to let in a light breeze but kept the shades pulled. He sat back in the chair and let his mind wander back through the day and how circumstances had changed so quickly. The girl no longer openly hated him- that was an improvement. And she finally believed he was telling the truth after being shot at three times and being held at gunpoint.

The clock began to read closer and closer to midnight and Steve's eyes began to close. He fought to stay awake just in case, but sleep got the better of him and he drifted off. That night, he experienced the first nightmare he'd had in almost six months.


	6. Progress

_Tiny flakes of snow swirled through the air and stung Steve's face as he crouched on the mountainside. The air was frigid, and the relentless wind bit through his suit, numb though he already was. His hands shook as he lifted the binoculars to his eyes for the last time. He stood and looked behind him at his elite, ragtag team of soldiers and friends. Morita and Falsworth were intently listening to the staticky transmissions on the radio. Dugan and Jones were preparing the equipment._

_He stood and took a step before Bucky intercepted him. His best friend stared down at the train tracks they were about to zipline towards. "Remember when I made you ride the Cyclone on Coney Island?" Bucky asked, still staring down the ravine._

_"Yeah, and I threw up?" He followed his friend's line of sight and gulped, instead staring at the mountain across from them._

_"This isn't payback, is it?"_

_"Now why would I do that?" Steve chuckled a little before he heard the train rumble toward them. Morita began to pack up the radio. The men were ready. Steve pulled out a hook and rod contraption and latched it onto the zip line. He had to move faster: the train was coming. It would be roaring around the corner any second now._

_"We've only got about a ten second window. You miss that window and we're all just bugs on a windshield!" he told them over his shoulder. He was forced to shout above the wind and rumble of the train turning into the ravine._

_"Better get moving, bugs!" Dugan added._

_Steve waited until the cry of "_ Maintenant _!" told him he was clear. He pushed off from the edge and sailed down the zipline, clinging desperately to the bar with frozen fingers._

_Bucky followed him, then the others, each with a shout of the one French word Steve knew. He planted his feet on the slick metal surface of the train roof. Instinct took over, training gained control of his muscles, and his brain slowed down. He crept across the roof and started to move through the motions he'd rehearsed in his head hundreds of times._

_If only he'd known that not everything would come away as planned._

_He and Bucky entered the train and moved cautiously forward. The next thing he knew, they were being shot at. He didn't remember much of the battle itself until the end. Bucky lifted the shield off the train floor to protect himself from the coming strike._

_Steve felt time slow. He knew what was coming. The chill of horror filled him as the shot bounced off the shield and flung Bucky against the train door that had been previously blasted open. He covered the distance between them after taking out their attacker and held out a hand for Bucky. He stretched as far as he could; he risked falling out of the train himself. Just a little further- if he could reach just a little further._

_He tried desperately to save his friend but the last thing he knew was Bucky's terrified face as he plummeted to a snowy death in the bottom of the ravine._

Steve woke with a start, panting and shaking as if he had relived the entire experience. Bucky was dead and it had been all Steve's fault. He could've done something! Moved faster, taken the shot, brought down the attacker sooner. Anything to save his friend. But no- he hadn't done anything, and it had cost him the life of his best friend. The last thing he'd been prepared for had shaken him to the core.

In frustration at his own stupidity and bitterness, Steve pounded a fist dully against the wall. It didn't make much of a thud and there was no dent. He squeezed his eyes shut and bent over with his fingers laced behind his neck.

When he sat up again, he saw Antoinette watching him. Wariness was written in the angles of her posture, concern etched in her expression but suspicion in her eyes. He looked away from her and down toward his shoulder.

He heard her say something but it wasn't quite loud enough for him to make out. When she repeated it, he looked up. "Um, I didn't know if, maybe, you wanted coffee or breakfast or anything but there is coffee if you would like and I will make breakfast if you are 'ungry?" She sounded timid, unsure what to expect from him.

He nodded, answering, "Yeah. Thank you."

She acknowledged his thanks with a tiny tight-lipped nod. Steve followed her to the kitchen and accepted the mug of black coffee she handed him. He took a scalding sip before turning to lean against the counter. He noticed that she stepped quickly away from him to lean on the opposite wall.

She didn't trust him, that much was clear. But it wasn't as if he was going to hurt her. He had saved her life after all. Yet she acted as if he were a young poisonous snake, curious to see what he would do, but scared of being bitten. He had already lost her trust so quickly after yesterday.

He watched as she took a sip of coffee before asking, "Did you sleep okay?"

She stared into her steaming cup and answered with a shrug, refusing to look up at him.

"I would have offered you the bed but you were already asleep and I didn't want to wake you," he tried again.

No response at all this time. She wouldn't look up, wouldn't speak, wouldn't come near him. He racked his brain for an idea of how to get her talking when she suddenly pushed off the wall and set her mug on the table. As she passed him, she muttered, "I will make breakfast."

He nodded slightly before setting his mug on the table as well. "Would you like help?" he asked.

Her back faced him as she searched the refrigerator, but he could see her stiffen. " _Non, merci,_ " she answered. She brought out the ingredients and set them on the counter beside the stove. Next, she began to search through cabinets.

"What are you looking for?" he asked.

He was glad when she replied but noticed she still refused to look up. "Frying pan?" she said.

Steve nodded and opened the cabinet with the pans. "What size?" he asked. Without replying in any way, she grabbed a pan and set it on the stovetop, turning a knob to start the heat.

"Are you sure you don't want help?" he tried again.

" _Très sûr_. Very sure." She began cracking eggs into a bowl but paused when he remained watching her. She rounded on him unexpectedly, "If you would like to know 'ow you may be of use, 'zen sit and be silent.  _S'il te plaît_." She turned just as abruptly back to the bowl and continued her work.

Steve was stunned. He didn't want to give her any other reason to hate him, so he sat and sipped his coffee as she cooked. When she'd finished, the product was two amazing French omelettes. They ate in tense silence before Steve stood and took their empty plates and mugs to the sink. He began to fill the sink with water to start washing when she came up beside him. Immediately, he took the opportunity.

"Is something wrong?" he asked, beginning to lose patience.

She pulled her hair into a bun with her fingers before answering with a shrug. " _Non_."

He didn't believe her but didn't know quite how to get her to talk. This was usually Natasha's area of expertise, not his. If only he could just ask her for help but Fury had said not to let on about anything Avengers related. He felt stranded. The same feeling he had on the train after Bucky had fallen.

They washed the dishes in silence, scrubbing, rinsing, and drying together. When the chore was done, Steve faced Antoinette. "What's going on?"

She turned away and began putting some of the dishes back in their cabinets. "What do you mean?" she answered.

"I think you know what I mean," he said, trying to think of a way to get her to open up.

She shook her head without looking at him. "I 'ave no idea." When she turned to grab the last plate, he caught her wrist and spun her to face him. At first, she was startled and just stared at his grip on her wrist as if his touch would burn her. When she overcame her surprise, she wrenched her wrist out of his grasp with a gasp, "Let go of me!"

He released her, but her reaction only confused him further. What was she scared of? "I wouldn't hurt you, you know," he told her calmly.

" _Je sais ça._ I know that," she said, watching him carefully now.

"Then what's bothering you?" he asked, patience beginning to run thin.

" _Rien_! Nothing!" she told him.

"Well there's obviously something or you wouldn't be acting like this," he retorted. She froze in the doorway and turned back to him with a huff of exasperation.

"It really is nothing. I promise." She shook her head a little with her eyes closed. "Just don't ask again."

She hesitated before turning and heading back to the living room. Steve put away the last plate before joining her. "Do you, uh, have any ballet today?" he stammered.

"At two," she replied, "There's a practice every day at two now until the performances."

He nodded, making a mental note to himself. Just as he was about to ask another question, a knock sounded at the door. Who could that be? He got up to open it and couldn't help but grin. Jerome and Jason stood on the steps with their ball, a pair of sticks, and hopeful expressions.

He could feel Antoinette come up to stand beside him. "Who is it?" she asked before she spotted the boys.

Jerome stood on tiptoe to see behind Steve and made a face when he saw Antoinette. " 'Oo iz she?" the boy asked him.

Steve chuckled and stepped aside. "Boys, this is Antoinette. Antoinette, this is Jerome and Jason."

"Is she _votre femme_?" Jason blurted out.

" 'e is asking if I am your wife," Antoinette translated for him.

Steve had difficulty not laughing outright. "No," he answered, letting through a small laugh. "No, I'm not married."

"Is she your  _petite amie_?" Jason asked again.

Steve didn't know what ' _petite_   _amie_ ' meant but apparently Antoinette did because she broke into a fit of giggles.

He felt awkward asking but he needed to know what it meant. "What did he say?" he asked her when she was able to breathe again.

"'e asked if," she had to pause as the giggles overtook her sentence. "'e asked if I was your sweetheart...your girlfriend."

Steve felt the heat creep up his neck and face as he tried not to laugh. "So, why are you boys here?" he asked to change the topic.

"Will you play with us?" Jerome asked.

Steve smiled and nodded before remembering Antoinette. He faced her and raised his eyebrows, expecting her answer. She smiled as well and nodded. Leaving the apartment, they followed the boys down the steps to the empty street. As they played, Steve could see Antoinette's shell melt away gradually until she appeared to be acting normal once again. She laughed and joked with the boys and even picked them up and spun them around when they tried to tag her.

Steve knelt to take a whack at the ball with his stick when he suddenly found himself tackled backwards to the pavement under the weight of both energetic boys. He fell backwards, laughing so hard he couldn't even struggle. He could hear Antoinette laughing from a couple feet away. The oppressive, dark cloud remaining from his nightmare began to dissipate.

\-------------------------------------------  
Author's Note: so how does everyone like the story so far? I'd love to hear what you think in the comments!


	7. Ouverture

The next day, Steve sat up on the sofa and stretched. The sizzles and pops of bacon as well as the accompanying enticing aroma wafted into the living room from the kitchen and encouraged him off the soft cushions. He hadn't slept well, having stayed awake most of the night to prevent another nightmare.

Yawning, he shuffled to the kitchen and was greeted with a mug of steaming coffee and plate of bacon and waffles. "Oh wow," he said. "Thank you." Antoinette smiled and joined him at the table with a pot of blueberry reduction of some sort. They ate with the usual small chatter and shared the task of dish washing.

After breakfast, he took what would have been a quick shower if he had remembered how to use the knobs and plugs correctly. Eventually, he finished and changed before heading back to the living room.

When they sat in the living room, Steve wondered why something hadn't occurred to him earlier. "The other day, at the café, when the man grabbed you, why didn't you try to fight back?"

"I wasn't taught to," she answered easily.

"But I thought you were an agent?"

"I am- or I was," she said, turning to face him.

"But then-" he started before she interrupted him.

"I wasn't ever taught because  _Directeur_  Fury wanted me as a solo undercover agent. As little suspicion as possible. I was never supposed to be found out and even if I was found out, the danger wasn't that real of a threat. My enemies weren't exactly hands-on forces," she explained.

"He never taught you just in case?"

She shook her head, curling a lock of blonde hair around her finger.

"Well, now the danger is real. You need to know how to protect yourself." He stood in front of where she sat on the couch and watched her expression change ever so slightly as she thought.

" _D'accord_. And you are willing to teach me?" she asked, standing and taking a step toward him.

"Of course," he replied.

"One condition." She held up a finger with a smirk. "If I let you teach me, then you will learn to speak French."

He blinked in surprise. That was probably the last thing he had expected her to say. "Oh, um, sure," he agreed.

"If you intend to stay in our country, you must be able to speak some of our language. Do you know anything in French already?" she continued.

"Um,  _merci_ ,  _bonjour_ ,  _maintenant_ ,  _soleil, français_." His knowledge was extremely limited in this area but he was glad he at least knew something.

"Is that all you know?" she asked.

He nodded. He grew up in old-time Brooklyn where the best educations were gained in alleys. They didn't teach French in fist-fights. And his schooling had focused on other topics. 

"Oh. It is something at least." She sat on the edge of the couch cushion and laced her fingers together, stretching each one in a sort of absent minded way.

"I'll start simple," he told her. "Stand up." She stood and he motioned for her to stand in front of him, gently turning her shoulders so her back was to him. "Just try to get away, alright?" He held his finger to her forehead in place of a gun and wrapped an arm around both of hers to hold her the way the assassins had two days previous.

She was still for a moment before going entirely limp and slipping right to the floor, rolling away. She popped up with a grin. " 'ow was that?"

"Good. Someone who is trying to hurt you would hold you tighter, so that trick might not always work," he explained, grabbing her again the same way. "Try again."

This time, she stomped on his foot. He gritted his teeth but kept his hold. She squirmed for a bit before taking the side of her foot to his shin and scraping downward. Normally, this would have hurt but she was only sock-footed so it had no effect. Her next tactic was to go limp again but he held her up until she got her feet under herself.

He could tell she was frustrated but he let her try. She struggled uselessly trying get an elbow in his ribs until she let out a huff of irritation and bit him in the shoulder. Hard. Immediately, he dropped her and stepped back. She stumbled out of his grasp, smiling triumphantly.

"Better. Could use some...refinement," he said, gritting his teeth.

"Battle is not refined," she retorted.

"Okay, let's try again."

" _Non_ ," she stated firmly.

"What?" He'd understood well enough but why was she telling him no? If she was held hostage again, she might be killed.

" _Non_ ," Antoinette repeated. "It means no."

"I know what it means," he said.

"Then why did you-"

"If you get caught again and your attacker doesn't hesitate, you'll die."

"No, I will not," she said, stretching her arms in front of her and curling her back gracefully.

"And how do you figure that when you can't escape?" he persisted.

"Because you will be there," she stated simply, letting her arms drop to her sides.

That caught him by surprise, and he hesitated in his answer. "I won't always be there. Try again."

She rolled her eyes and allowed herself to be held again. After a whole minute of absolutely no movement from her, he said, "Do something. An assassin won't wait. You'll be dead."

"I told you I will not do it," she retorted.

He waited another minute for her to try anything at all before saying "bang" with exasperated impatience and applying the smallest amount of pressure to her temple with his finger. He let her go and she twirled to sink onto the couch cushion.

"Has anyone ever told you you're extremely stubborn?" he snapped.

"Almost every day," she spat back.

He clenched his jaw. Difficult! That's all this girl could be! He'd tried playing nice, he'd tried being firm, he'd even tried ignoring her. Nothing worked! Insults just rolled off her or were returned with witty remarks. Questions were diverted, instructions were refused, demands were disobeyed. How could anyone possibly put up with her? She was a living, breathing nightmare!

He released a pent up breath and sank onto the other end of the sofa. "Alright then. You said I should learn French. We might as well start now."

A satisfied smirk lifted one corner of her mouth. "I will say a word and you repeat it back to me." She pointed at him. " _Un_   _homme_."

" _Un_   _homme_ ," he repeated. "What's it mean?"

"Man," she replied. She then pointed to herself. " _Une femme_."

He repeated after her each time, asking afterward what it meant. At the end of an hour, he had learned a handful of useful words including the colors, numbers, different foods and the time. When she announced that they were finished, he thought his head would burst. His thoughts swirled dangerously in a muddled puddle of foreign words.

He stood and stretched, avoiding hitting Antoinette in the head as she ducked under his arms.

"I was thinking I could go to the  _th_ _ê_ _atr_ _e_  early to warm up before the others got there. There's no time afterward to practice so I would 'ave to go before." She called to him from the kitchen. He could hear her pouring a glass of water at the sink.

"That's fine. What time do you want to be there?"

"Um, around-" her voice was interrupted by a gasp and the sound of shattering glass on tile.

He rushed into the kitchen and found her on her knees beside a spreading pool of water and broken glass. She was trying to pick out some of the larger pieces but the sharp edges prevented much from being accomplished. He bent to his knees beside her and began clearing up the glass. "I'll get the glass, can you find a towel or something to wipe up the water?"

She nodded and tried to dump the shards from her hands to his. He wasn't watching what he was doing until she left the kitchen and he noticed that one of the larger shards was dripping scarlet into his palm. He didn't feel any pain so why was there blood? He realized it must be Antoinette's.

When she returned with the towel, he carefully threw away the glass he'd collected off the floor. Before she could bend to mop the water from the tile, he caught her wrist and turned her palm upward. In the center, a thin slice ran diagonally across her skin.

She ripped her hand away from him and bent, using her good hand to mop up the mess. Steve let her but left the kitchen and searched the bathroom closet for something he'd seen just earlier that morning. When he found it, he returned to the kitchen and offered to help her off the floor.

She refused his help, preferring instead to stand on her own. Why so stubborn? He was just trying to help, and she had to give him a hard time about it. He handed her the bandaid and left the kitchen, knowing she wouldn't want his help with anything more.

When she finally came back into the living room, this time with a plastic cup of water, she leaned against the wall near the window. "So what time did you want to be at the theatre?" he asked.

"One o'clock?" she answered softly without looking around at him.

"And practice starts at two?" he continued, standing to check the clock.

She nodded. "Now say it  _en_   _Français_."

"Um," he faltered, " _Commence_   _á_   _deux_?"

She giggled a little before stepping away from the window to face him. " _Pratique commence á_ _quatorze_ _heures_." She set her water on the endtable and stepped close to Steve.

He felt uncomfortable with her so close, but there was no room behind him to back up. He swallowed uneasily. The scent of lilacs and sweet peas reached his nose, an odd combination but it smelled pleasant. It must be her perfume, he thought. Something else...cinnamon?

Steve shook his head quickly to clear it. What was he thinking? He needed to focus on keeping her safe and he couldn't do that if he got distracted so easily by such flippant things. She gave him a curious look before backing off with a little twirl and heading for the bedroom to get her backpack.

He followed her down the hall, leaving several strides between them. Her invasion of his personal space had been awkward enough without having to repeat the scene. He stood at the doorway while she grabbed her bag and filled it with everything she would need.

For a tense moment, he couldn't remember where he had hidden his shield, but relaxed when it returned to his memory. The previous night, while Antoinette showered, he had hidden the shield behind the bureau. It was one of the last places she would purposefully look for something if she became suspicious, and not a spot to happen upon something accidentally. She couldn't know he was an avenger. The entire mission would fall apart.

They arrived at the theater and Steve cleared the building while Antoinette changed. She had said there was a room behind the stage she could use, so he waited for her when he'd finished. She left the room with her bag over one shoulder and led him down the center aisle of the auditorium. To the left was a door Steve hadn't seen before on any visit he'd made previously. The door was set away in the shadows, inconspicuous if you weren't looking for it.

They entered the back room and Antoinette set her bag on a chair. The room was spacious and relatively empty with the entire far wall covered in mirrors. He leaned in the doorway and watched as she set up what Tony had taught him was a portable Bluetooth speaker. It played music from what he could figure out, but other than that, it just emitted radio static whenever he tried to work it.

As she continued, he let his eyes rove over the room again. Rectangular with one doorway at each narrow end, one of which he stood by. The ceiling was low enough to feel sheltered but high enough to allow leaps and lifts and all that from the dancers.

He jumped when music began to play. It wasno't the music he expected to hear- classical or instrumental- instead, what he heard surprised him- some sort of modern rock or whatever it was called now. There was a strong beat keeping the tempo and some sort of wailing sound as the melody. He hid his cringe and tried to block out the noise.

A line of windows to his left set high in the wall shed bright sunshine into the room and made the dark hardwood floor appear to glow. Antoinette was stretching at the wall, eyes closed and expression focused, with one leg straight up and her forehead pressed to her knee. Was that even supposed to be possible?

The song changed to one that Steve had heard playing in Clint's room before. What was it called? Hey James, hey John, hey Jacob... It was something like that. When the chorus started, he remembered. "Hey Jude!" He hadn't meant to say it aloud but it sort of slipped out.

Antoinette uncoiled herself from her position on the floor and nodded with a slight laugh. " _Oui_ , it is one of my favorites. Do you like The Beatles?"

"The what?" he asked. Beetles? Like the bugs?

"The Beatles? The band that wrote the song?" she continued, standing and rolling her shoulders.

"Oh, I'm not sure. I haven't really heard a lot of their songs I guess," he answered.

She tipped her head curiously before pulling her hair into a tight French braid and beginning to warm up. When the song ended, she changed the- what had Tony called it? A playing list? -to something more suited for dancing but still with a heavy, fast beat.

Steve watched her twirl and leap her way around the room to various songs. When a particular song came on, Antoinette froze and her face lit up. " _J'adore_   _cette_   _chanson_!" He tried to decipher what she'd said and came to the rocky conclusion that she liked the song. He wasn't sure; she could have said that she liked the chair, but he thought that was a little too off. She turned the volume up several intervals before doing a little circle of small but energetic jumps.

When the playlist ended, the majority of an hour had gone by and Antoinette was satisfied. He watched her pack away her music and end by stretching again. She stood and grabbed her bag before breezing past him and out the door. He followed closely, keeping an eye out for anything that might be suspicious in or near the building.

He endured another seven hours of classical music and giggling girls in tutus before he and Antoinette began their walk back to the apartment. She was silent most of the way and dropped immediately onto the couch when they were safely inside. Exhausted, she was out cold in seconds and snored lightly until she rolled onto her side. Steve draped a blanket over her before pulling up his chair and taking his usual post at the window. Before he knew it, he too was sound asleep.


	8. Traître

The next week and a half passed in a blur of self-defense lessons and French phrases for Steve. Each day he and Antoinette would keep their ends of the deal and teach the other for an hour before swapping. The foreign words and sentence structures came easier and easier for Steve the more he heard them from Antoinette. He still failed to converse with her or understand what she said when she spoke in French, but at least it was progress. In turn, Antoinette was now able to escape four different holds and had managed to get the "gun" once. He still wasn't certain she would be able to escape from a real hostage situation, but at least it was something.

At the end of a week and a half, Antoinette was so excited for her matinée that Steve couldn't get her to stay in one place for more than ten minutes at a time. If she wasn't spouting long and jumbled sentences in French to the open air or dancing in the middle of the living room, she was literally climbing up the walls in the hallway or pacing quickly from room to room. She reminded him of a hummingbird caught in a glass cage.

The morning of the matinée, she woke Steve at four thirty in the morning singing "What A Wonderful World" in French. He groaned and rolled off the couch, narrowly missing the coffee table with his forehead. A glance out the window told him that the sun hadn't yet risen and that the street was quiet. "If the sun's not up, then I don't have to be either," he grumbled before pulling his blanket off the couch and curling up there on the floor to go back to sleep.

His rest was brief when he was woken again at six when Antoinette tripped over him on her way to the kitchen, pacing again. She bounced back up and kept going, muttering to herself in French. He sat up and rubbed his face, knowing he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep.

"Can't you stay still?" he mumbled.

" _Non_ , too much energy." She paced up and down the hallway before sitting on the end of the coffee table and popping up again.

"How much sleep did you get?" he asked again, getting to his feet and avoiding her arm as she performed a portion of her solo in the middle of the hallway.

"Eh, four hours?" she replied.

He stepped into the kitchen and poured himself some coffee before heading back to the living room. No sign of Antoinette. "Only four hours?"

" _Oui_ ," she answered from somewhere down the hallway.

At first he didn't see her due to the dim morning light, but when he looked up, she was eight feet off the ground with her arms and legs braced against the walls to hold herself up.

"Have you had anything to eat?" He wondered how she'd gotten up there to begin with. Then he realized that the span between the walls was about four and a half feet. It would be the perfect width for her to climb as long as she kept even pressure on all four limbs. As he thought this, one of her hands slipped and she ducked into a roll as she hit the floor. "You alright?" he asked with a small measure of concern. She wasn't getting up but appeared completely fine. She then began to laugh so hard her whole body shook until tears streamed out of her eyes and her giggles were broken by hiccups.

"Help?" she gasped between bouts of laughter. He was dumbfounded. She'd just climbed up eight feet to the ceiling and fallen, and now she was laughing. As he hesitated, she held her arms up to signal for help again. After setting his coffee down, Steve stepped forward with a chuckle and crossed his wrists to help her to her feet. Her long fingers wrapped around his hands as he pulled her up.

They cooked breakfast together and sat to eat before sharing the dish washing when they'd finished. As Steve dried the last plate, a question occurred to him that he wondered why he hadn't thought of earlier. "The other day, the glass that broke, how did you drop it?"

"Oh, I um, couldn't reach the cabinet very well, so I sat on the counter to get it, and when I slid down again, I knocked it with my hand accidentally," she replied, pausing intermittently. She ducked her face in embarrassment and turned away from him slightly.

"It's alright," he said. "I'm not mad, I just wanted to know."

She turned back towards him a little before checking the clock and beginning her pacing again.

"Do you always do that before a performance?" he wondered aloud.

" _Non_. Not always. I need to work out extra energy," she answered, retracing her path to him and sitting on the counter, swinging her feet. "This is my first solo-"

She broke off and pushed away from the counter to resume her pacing. Maybe she was working out the extra energy, but she looked nervous to him. Nerves were normal, so why didn't she just admit that she was a little scared?

At noon, Antoinette announced that it was time to head to the theater. She packed up her backpack and climbed the hallway walls one last time. Before they left, Steve made sure he had his keys, Swiss Army knife, and phone in case of emergency. For a minute, he debated if he should find a way to bring his shield in case the assassins tried to get her again. There was no easy, inconspicuous way for him to carry the shield, so he left it tucked snugly behind the bureau.

They walked side by side down the familiar side streets to the grand stone building. He held the door for her before following her in. Almost immediately, he was stopped.

" _Billet_?" the doorman demanded.

Steve froze. He didn't have a ticket. Fortunately, Antoinette stepped in. " _Monsieur, il est avec moi_. 'e is with me."

The doorman stepped aside and let them pass. She told him to sit in the right section of seats near the aisle halfway toward the stage. When asked why, she simply answered, "So I will know where to look."

He cleared the building again before choosing his seat. He sat exactly where she had told him to, only making sure his seat was the very end. If he needed to get up, this spot would be an excellent position to move from. The biggest con was that he couldn't see anything going on in the balcony above him. If the assassin shot from the balcony, Steve would be unable to stop him.

The building began to fill until the hum of mingling voices filled the air. Men and women from nine to ninety-nine filed into their seats and chattered to each other. He tried to listen to the conversation nearest him to see if he could pick out anything he knew, but the couple was speaking way too fast for him to understand.

When he cast his eyes around the room for anyone suspicious, he caught sight of Antoinette gesturing to him from the door beside the stage to the right. She was motioning for him to come to her and so he did. He left his seat and made his way toward where she stood, stopping just inside the door.

Immediately, he took in her appearance. Her dress was the palest shade of sky blue he had ever seen and draped in thin, silky layers to her knees; strapped to her shoulders was a set of glittery white feather wings that seemed too heavy for her be able to dance in. Her hair was tied back in a bun like usual and her makeup had already been done.  _She looks like an angel_ , he thought before realizing that's exactly how she was supposed to look. She closed the door behind him and smiled uneasily. "Do you see anyone that might-"

She broke off when he shook his head. "There's no one here that I can see is part of the group that wants to get you."

" _Bon_ ," she replied, still looking a little shaken.

"You're nervous," he said. He didn't know what made him say that but it slipped out anyway.

Her eyes narrowed when she looked up at him but after a short pause, she sighed and directed her stare at the ground. " _Oui_. I am terrified."

"You've got nothing to be afraid of. You'll do fine," he encouraged.

" 'ow do you know?"

That caught him off guard. "I'm not sure how I know, but you will."

What she did next surprised him. She stood on the tips of her slippers and gave him a tiny kiss on the cheek. Well, not quite the cheek since she couldn't reach that high, but just a little above his jaw. When she returned to her regular height, she turned quickly and he had to step back to avoid her wings. A voice called her name from down the hallway and she turned back to him with a slight sigh. "I 'ave to go," she told him before starting down the hallway. When he turned to go back to his seat, he felt a tug at the hem of his bomber jacket. She stood beside him when he pivoted to find the source. "There's an intermission between the two acts," she began. "Um, maybe, if you can, can you meet me by this door again?"

He nodded with a small smile before she thanked him and ran down the hallway again. He found his seat in the few short minutes before the production began. Almost the same second he was comfortable, the lights dimmed and the music started up.

The first act was...odd. From what Steve could gather, there were the good angels and the bad angels. Or maybe they were fairies... But they were more likely angels. The queens of both groups were fighting over a mortal man who had promised himself to the good angel queen but the bad angel queen had laid claim to him after saving his life. The fantastical idea of it all made his head spin.

Eventually, war broke out and the dark angels were capturing the good angels and taking them hostage to turn them into bad angels. He wasn't quite following the logic of it, but the music to accompany the dancers was nice. Of the thirty or so girls on stage, he had trouble finding Antoinette at first, but when the hostage angels were captured, he found her among them. When the good angels became bad angels, it was easier to pick her out because she was the only blonde dancer dressed in black.

Just as the war was reaching a climax, the bad angel queen was killed. Intermission followed and the lights were brightened to allow those watching to move around. Steve stood and stretched before making his way through the crowd to the door. He slipped behind it and found the dancers milling about in the hallway, some wiping off makeup, some pulling off black wings and exchanging them for white.

A single dancer broke away from the others and jogged toward him. Her silky black dress fell flatteringly around her figure and wisps of hair drifted out of her bun to tickle her ears. She'd already shed her black wings and her dark makeup had been removed.

"Steve!" she gasped breathlessly when she reached him. "What did you think?"

"It was great," he told her. "The story is a little out there but I like it."

She beamed at him before dragging him by the wrist away from the door to a more secluded area. In the closed space, he could detect the scent of roses. It drifted off her and formed a pleasant cloud between them. Passing dancers jostled them until Steve stood with his back against the wall and Antoinette in front of him only a few inches away.

"So why did you want me to come back here?" he asked.

She smirked slightly, eyes twinkling. "No real reason, I guess. But I wasn't nervous the first time after we talked so I thought maybe..." she trailed off.

"You thought I could help now too," he finished for her.

"Something like zat," she purred, closing some of the space between them.

He swallowed uncomfortably, reminded of the time when Pvt. Lorraine had decided to unpleasantly 'thank' him. He would have backed away if he could, but there was no room to move.

She must have read his expression because she backed away a little. He took a deep breath before opening his mouth to say something. They were interrupted by a dancer dressed in green and white who told Antoinette something quickly in French. Antoinette nodded repeatedly and answered her with what he realized later he understood to mean "I know." The dancer in green left again so that they found themselves alone in the narrow hallway.

"I 'ave to go soon," she said, but she didn't make any movement that might suggest leaving.

"If you need to go, I don't want you to be late," he told her.

"I won't be," she replied, letting her eyes search his face. "So no parting words of encouragement?"

He blinked dumbly. "Uh..." With her so close, his brain had shut down. He wasn't thinking straight. Words were becoming tougher to form and breathing was complicated. He'd never felt this way around Peggy. Everything had been simple, clear, like it was supposed to be. Peggy had never made him nervous like with Antoinette.

When she realized he wouldn't speak, her face fell and she stepped away. She managed a slight smile as she turned to go. "The audience will be filling their seats. You should leave."

He nodded and left the back hallway, finding his seat again. He was in his seat for only a minute before the lights dimmed and the music began again. The performance took up with the death of the bad queen and the mourning of her dark angels.

The next scene was blurry in his mind because his thoughts had turned to Peggy. When the lights onstage flickered, he was brought back to earth. The fake lightning crossed above the stage again and illuminated the dancers below. Makeshift cages sat on the ground each with two occupants who fought against the doors.   
The lightning intensified until the doors fell off the cages and the angels were released. They danced offstage, each brainwashed dark angel becoming a good angel again. The stage emptied gradually until no one was left. The lights dimmed, the music softened, and a shadow flitted onto the stage.

As soon as he saw the dancer, Steve knew it was Antoinette. She leapt and twirled across the stage, white feather wings fluttering behind her. Her graceful shadow followed each floating movement and twist. She bent and tumbled and danced across the smooth floor until the climax of her solo. She spun thirteen times around before sinking elegantly to the ground and stretching backwards.

The music slowed until only the vibrato of the violins stretched in the air. Tension hung on every member of the audience until the wait must end. Before the music could start again, before Antoinette could move an inch, the tension was shattered by a sound Steve knew all too well. A sound he wished to never hear again as long as he lived. A sound that brought back wave upon wave of painful memories. The sound of a muffled sniper shot.


	9. Nightmare

Steve was the first to spring from his seat. He had a split second to debate whether to sprint to the stage or to the balcony where the shot clearly came from. If he ran for the sniper, accomplices would be able to carry Antoinette off without any opposition. If he ran for the stage to protect her, the sniper would have a chance to make a second shot.

This clearly was not part of the performance. Antoinette was frozen in fear on the stage. She was standing- that was a good sign- but she was clutching her ribs- a very bad sign. She looked up to exactly the spot where he stood and their eyes met. "Go!" he shouted, making up his mind. The audience created enough chaos by now that if there were accomplices, it would be difficult for them to reach her.

She nodded, taking off toward the stage exit. He sprinted toward the balcony and ran into the sniper on the staircase. The man was dressed similarly to the assailants at the café but with a dark cloth covering his lower face. He froze when he saw Steve before turning and sprinting back the way he'd come, taking the stairs three at a time.

Steve chased after him, catching him at the top step to the balcony and throwing him to the ground. The balcony was empty the entire length around the theater, making it possible for the sniper to shoot without witnesses.

The masked man stood and kicked at Steve, but he caught the man's ankle and pushed him aside again _._  While on the floor, the sniper pulled something from his pocket that glinted in the dim light of the balcony. The man lunged off the floor and too late, Steve ducked the blade, receiving a nick down his jaw.

Drops of warm blood dropped to his palm where he wiped them away on his pants. With a quick snag, he latched his grip around the man's wrist and twisted so that he was forced to drop the knife. It landed on the carpet with a muffled thunk, and Steve kicked it away to the seats where the attacker would be unable to retrieve it.

They scuffled for a minute before Steve grabbed the masked man's shirt collar and ripped away his face covering. He didn't recognize the man, but it didn't matter. The man kneed him in the stomach, causing Steve to stumble backward and lose his grip. The sniper slid to the floor and scrambled to his feet before taking his chance to race down the stairwell.

Steve took off after him, trying to get a good breath of air into his burning lungs. On the stairs, he managed to grab the sniper's shoulders from behind and pulled him down so the man's head connected roughly with the steps. The man's limp body slid down the rest of the way and stopped at the bottom.

Steve jumped over the motionless figure and sprinted toward the stage exit he'd seen Antoinette run toward. The sound of his footsteps must have reached her because he heard her scream his name. Following the sound of her voice, he raced into the back room and almost tripped over an unconscious body at the doorway. He scooped up the man's gun and glanced quickly around the room.

Antoinette was being held by her throat with her back against the wall. Her satin-slippered feet scrambled against the wall, helpless beneath her since she couldn't touch the ground. Her fingernails were scraping desperately at the fingers holding her, gouging bloody grooves through her attacker's skin.

The masked man was slowly constricting his fingers, shouting at her in French that Steve didn't understand. She kept repeating a choked response, and this was clearly angering the man. She took a strangled breath before spitting in her attacker's face, infuriating him. He used his free hand to wipe his eyes clean before gripping her throat tighter and tossing her to the floor.

As she gasped for air and convulsed on the ground, the assassin pulled his gun from a pocket holster and aimed it at Antoinette. Training took hold and Steve pulled the trigger before the attacker could. The man's body slumped to the ground, lifeless.

He paused before dropping the gun and sliding to a stop beside Antoinette on his knees. She was breathing heavily, fighting for air as dark bruises bloomed on her collar bone and neck. Dark blood had soaked through the front of her pale blue dress and begun to dry. From what he could tell, it wasn't a bullet wound, more like the bullet had grazed across her ribs and abdomen instead of hitting her. Her eyes were squeezed shut in pain but she seemed otherwise alright.

When she was breathing normally again, she gently pushed herself up before Steve reached out to help her. He had meant to gently help her sit up, but when she flinched away in pain, he let her do it on her own. Her tightly tied hair had fallen halfway down and rested against her neck, the smaller pieces clinging to her skin.

"Can you stand?" he asked. She nodded weakly, attempting to get her feet under herself. He gripped her forearm and supported her until she could lean against the wall. The bruising on her collarbone had darkened and spread up her neck. She clutched her ribs with one hand, forearm hiding the length of the wound.

"Let's get you out of here," he told her, helping her out of the back room and through the empty auditorium to the room the girls used to change. He stood guard outside the door until she was finished. She'd pulled on black leggings and a sweatshirt that covered most of the bruises on her neck.

"Let's just leave," she croaked. "Before someone shows up."

He nodded and they began the familiar walk back to his apartment.

He stood in the kitchen trying to busy himself while Antoinette showered. An hour later, she stepped into the kitchen in the same black leggings as earlier but had swapped the sweatshirt with an oversized cream sweater. Her hair was wet and piled on top of her head in a bun. The bruises seemed lighter but he knew it was impossible for them to be healing already. She'd most likely attempted to hide them with makeup.

"I'm so sorry," he started apologizing, but she stopped him with a dispirited shake of her head.

"You 'ave no reason to be sorry. It is no one's fault and especially not yours. You saved my life...again." She stood by the window but faced him with her eyes aimed at the floor.

With two steps, he crossed the gap between them and slipped a steaming mug of peppermint tea into her fingers. She smiled up at him in thanks before taking a sip and warming her fingers on the ceramic mug.

"That scrape across your ribs," he started hesitantly. "That's the bullet wound?"

She nodded slowly. "It grazed me. Nothing to worry about."

He wanted to protest that she should do something more for it, but there was nothing more she could do. If it was just a graze, it would heal without trouble.

"There were two men that went after you. Did you knock out the first one?" he asked again.

She hesitated before answering, "Partially. All I did was push him backwards and 'e tripped over- a bookcase or- or something- hit his head. Next thing I knew, there was a different man with his hand on my throat and I couldn't breathe and-" She cut herself off, ducking her face away in embarrassment.

"But you're fine now and that's all that matters." She looked back up at him and smiled before sipping the tea again. "Are you hungry?"

She shook her head. " _Non, merci_."

" _Je t'en prie_ ," he answered. "Did I get it right that time?"

She laughed a little, a delicate, fragile sound. " _Non,_ but keep trying." He could tell she wanted to ask him something, but she wasn't sure whether she should or not. After a few minutes of easy silence, she took a sip before blurting out, "What was it like in the war?"

He swallowed. He couldn't tell her what it was really like or she'd know immediately that something was wrong. "I'd rather not talk about it," he covered.

There was a tiny pause before she added, "Please?" She seemed desperate to know.

Why did she want to know? War was cruel and harsh, bloody and violent. War didn't discriminate when it came to who would die and who would live. It was terrifying at best, and at worst- he didn't want to think about it. War wasn't a game, it was very much real, and not something people discussed in everyday conversation.

Yet her tone made him answer, however reluctant he was in doing so. "It was chaos in its purest form. You're being shot at, and you're shooting back, and you don't know what's gone on until it's all over."

" 'ave you ever been shot at?" she asked.

"When you're a soldier, being shot at is the only thing you can be sure of."

"Were you ever hit?"

He had to think before answering. "Once, I think," he replied. "In the shoulder. It wasn't really a hit because it wasn't any worse than if I'd been stabbed with a dull pencil."

"Did you ever see someone die? Someone on your side? A friend?"

Steve didn't want to answer. He could think of too many people he'd known that had died in the war. The horrified expression on Bucky's face as he fell into the chasm came to life on his mind's eye. But he had to give a response. She was waiting for his answer. He nodded, at first not trusting himself to speak but eventually saying, "I've seen more people die than I'd like to admit, but most of them were enemy soldiers." He sighed before continuing, "My best friend Bucky died in the war as well."

" _Je suis désolée_ ," she muttered.

He stared out the window at the fading sunlight, not seeing the Parisian skyline, but the icy mountains forming the steep ravine that had claimed the life of his closest friend. A light touch at his elbow jarred him back to reality.

Antoinette stood beside him, head tilted upward to see his face. He accepted her empty mug and set it in the sink before stepping away from the counter. She led the way to the living room and perched on the edge of the coffee table as he sat on the sofa. For want of a sound other than silence, she turned on the radio.

The announcer was speaking in excited French that made no sense to Steve but must have made sense to her because she quickly changed the station. This announcer spoke thickly accented English, but it was clear what he was talking about: the theatre shooting. Antoinette changed the station again but sighed three stations later when the only thing they heard was the report of the theatre shooting.

When nine o'clock came, he dragged a chair from the kitchen to the living room and sat beside the window. She curled up on the couch with a blanket and throw pillow but he could tell she wasn't sleeping. He didn't blame her; after everything she'd been through today, he didn't think anyone in her position would be able to sleep.

As the night thickened outside, his mind began to replay the sound of the sniper shot. The same sound Bucky's gun had made so many years ago. He could remember exactly where he was standing almost every time his friend had saved his life with just one properly placed bullet. Bucky had always had his back, but when it mattered most, Steve couldn't save him.

And then there was Peggy. He would never forget the sound of those five shots as they hit his shield. Or the sound of the one shot she'd used to save his life at the Hydra base. And now, he'd never see her again to thank her. He sighed and closed his eyes, wishing for a time machine. Maybe he could ask Stark about it the next time they met. Maybe Thor knew a way. Steve would do anything.

Steve drifted off to sleep until dawn when a sharp rap at the door woke him with a start. His eyes shot open and he glanced toward the couch. Antoinette was sitting up, propped against the arm of the sofa, fingers wrapped so tightly around the blanket that her knuckles were white. So he wasn't just hearing things.

He held his breath, listening for any sound that might give away who was at the door. After a tense minute, the knock came again, more urgent this time. He stood, fishing his knife from his pocket just in case. When he opened the door, he would have been less surprised to see the assassins. The last person he'd expected to see stood on the doorstep in the early dawn light.

"What are you doing here?" Steve demanded.


	10. Visitor

"Well, that's no way to greet a friend," Tony Stark said, pushing past Steve into the apartment. "Where's the damsel in distress?"

Steve gritted his teeth in agitation. "You haven't answered me, Stark."

"No, I guess I haven't. Don't think I will." The cocky billionaire made his way to the living room where he flashed a grin at Antoinette. Steve felt his insides boiling. She looked hesitantly between the two men before sitting up a little straighter.

"Steve?" The way she said his name, higher pitched than usual and with a break in the middle, unnerved him for some reason.

He heaved a sigh before sitting on the edge of the unoccupied sofa cushion. "Antoinette, this is Tony Stark, SHIELD consultant and inventor of the Ironman suit."

"Uh _,_ I _am_ Ironman _,"_ he corrected. Tony faced Steve and motioned with his head for them to leave the room.

He hesitated before glancing at Antoinette. "I'll be back," he told her before getting up and following his annoying visitor down the hall to the bedroom.

Tony closed the door behind them, staring defiantly up at Steve. "Fury sent me," he started. Before Steve could interrupt, he held up a hand and continued. "He says he underestimated whoever wants the girl, so he's pulling some strings. He has an ally undercover here as the instructor. There's a notice being sent as we speak that the ballet, despite its little mishap, will be traveling around France to perform at cities all over the country. And of course, the girl goes with them."

"But-"

"Oh you'll still see her." Stark smirked and leaned against the wall. "He's just getting her away from Paris for awhile. You're being recalled to the Helicarrier."

"What?" Steve couldn't believe what he was hearing. Did Fury think he wasn't doing well enough? Didn't Fury trust him? "And what if the assassins follow her? I won't be there to help her when she needs me."

"Needs you?" Tony scoffed. "I've read her file, Cap. She doesn't need anyone. All that girl needs is a pen and she can have you at her mercy. I'm surprised she hasn't killed  _you_  yet. Or maybe-"

"Shut up," he snapped.

A trademark smirk spread across Tony's scheming face. "Ooh, got feelings for the girl already?"

"I said shut up." He forced himself to take a deep breath before continuing more calmly. "But whoever wrote her file was exaggerating. She's athletic, but she doesn't know how to fight. She told me that Fury never taught her because it might compromise her cover. I don't know who wrote that file, but it's not true."

"Coulson wrote her file, Rogers. He trained her. I think he knew what she was capable of. And I trust his word far more than the word of some girl." Stark pointed his finger back in the direction of the living room.

"Exactly. Yeah, Coulson trained her, yeah, he wrote her file, but he also raised her. From what she's told me-"

"Yes! Stop right there!  _'What she's told you.'_  You can't rely on her word alone. Of course she'll pretend to be innocent, that's what assassins do."

"I trust her, Stark!" Steve lowered his voice, not wanting the general volume to rise in case Antoinette heard them. "She can't even defend herself. I'm pretty sure that she'd give up playing pretend if it meant she could be safe. She almost died twice already. Besides, if she could do everything it says in her file, Fury wouldn't have needed me here to begin with."

A muscle in Tony's jaw tightened. He knew Steve was right, he just didn't want to admit it.

"If that's all you were here for, then you can leave now," Steve told him.

"No worries about that, Capsicle. I'm out of here. Tomorrow, after the girl leaves, pack up and head to where you were dropped off."

Steve nodded and opened the door, leading the way to the living room where the aroma of fresh coffee wafted in from the kitchen. As he stepped into the kitchen, Antoinette handed him a steaming mug and sipped her own. Stark saluted him sarcastically before leaving the apartment and disappearing down the street.

"What was zat about?" she asked him, hopping onto the counter and swinging her feet.

"Nothing important," he lied, leaning against the counter beside her.

She didn't believe him, and he could tell, but explaining would ruin everything. Not to mention, telling her would crumble the fragile beginnings of a friendship between them. There was a minuscule chance that if he told her the truth, she might believe him and understand the problem. A higher chance said that she slapped him before storming out.

He wouldn't take that chance.

Instead, he left the kitchen in silence and opened the shades on the living room windows. "Is zere something you are keeping from me?" she asked him, following him out.

He shook his head, guilty about having to lie to her, but it was for the better. "Nothing that needs to be known."

"Even if it is trivial, I want to know," she insisted.

He turned around to face her, surprised by how close she was. "It- it really isn't important. I promise I'll tell you if it is." He took a step away from her a little too quickly. Great, now he'd made a promise he couldn't keep on top of all the lies he'd been telling her. If the guilt didn't kill him, Antoinette would if she found out.

He heaved a sigh and sank heavily onto the couch. He expected her to perch on the coffee table or sit on the other end of the couch or lean on a wall, but if he knew one thing about her- she wasn't what he expected. And again, against all expectations, she did something to surprise him.

Antoinette took a step that brought her toe to toe with him and grabbed both of his large, scarred hands in her smaller, long-fingered ones. She pulled him to his feet and brought him to the window. "You don't 'ave plans for today, do you?" she asked.

He shook his head, wondering where she was going with this. A small voice inside his head whispered for her to release his hands, but another voice contradicted and begged her to stay. He squelched the second voice and began encouraging the first.

"Then I know what we will do," she announced.

Steve was completely confused. "What do you mean?" he asked.

"I will show you around Paris," she said, bubbling over with excitement. She'd released his hands but remained close enough to cause him mild discomfort.

"That sounds great," he agreed, genuinely glad to get away and do something before she left.

" _D'accord_. To see everything before dark, we should leave soon." It was already nearing seven and the sun was reflecting its early morning light on windows and puddles. A pale pink glow seemed to cover everything from the shingled roofs to the flower boxes to the people going about their errands.

It took them half an hour to get ready before they left the apartment. Antoinette led him down street after street until he was unfamiliar with the scenery. As they passed a café, he lost sight of her in a mob of tourists and bulky backpacks. For a second, he panicked, thinking the assassins might have taken her in the time he couldn't see.

"Antoinette?" he called out over the heads of the others in the group. Before she could reply, he caught sight of her bouncing blonde ponytail and pushed through the crowd to walk beside her again.

The spring air had warmed to a comfortable enough temperature for tshirts and jeans but a chilly breeze threatened. As they continued their walk through what Antoinette called the most historic portion of Paris, the sun and movement warmed him enough to remove his bomber jacket and fold it to carry in his fist.

She pointed out monuments and significant locations, giving a brief history for each. She acted the part of tour guide for him and even warned him not to touch something because it would hurt the structure. The back stories to each building or famous birthplace or battle monument brought questions to mind that he would pose to her, and not once had she been stumped.

"How often do you come through here?" he asked.

"Whenever I get bored," she answered simply.

"And how often do you get bored?"

She smirked before answering, "Occasionally."

"You really know everything about this place, don't you?"

"Not everything," she told him, glancing over her shoulder away from him. "There's one place I 'ave never been that I 'ave always wanted to visit."

"Oh? And where's that?"

She tilted her face back to see his eyes and answered in complete seriousness: "The catacombs."

"Why haven't you ever gone?" he wondered.

She sighed. "I 'ave tried but it is either closed for structural maintenance or the tickets 'ave sold out."

"Do we have time now?" He would love to see the catacombs, even if the idea creeped him out a little.

She checked her watch before nodding. " _Oui_ , we can check. We are not too far from the ticket office."

"Let's go then," Steve encouraged.

Her face broke into a smile as she led the way toward the catacombs. In only a few minutes, they had arrived outside a ticket window crowded by a group of tourists. A few seemed to be arguing with the window manager in angry tones.

He glanced down to check if Antoinette was still beside him. When he saw her expression, so disappointed and hopeless, he sighed and gently tapped her with his elbow. "Closed?" he guessed.

She nodded, turning around and leaving without a word. He had to hurry his first steps to catch up to her. When he did, she stared at her feet and kicked a pebble as she walked, dragging her feet slightly. He wanted to cheer her up a little but didn't know how.

They continued their sight seeing until half past four when both were too hungry to continue. "Can I choose where we eat?" she asked, eyes shining mischievously.

He shrugged and smiled, not minding where they ate at all. "Go ahead."

She stepped up to an outdoor café and ordered their food in lilting French. When it arrived, the waiter had brought it in paper carry-out bags. Steve gave her a questioning expression but her only reply was, "You will see."

She led him through crowded streets to a place Steve had only seen in pictures. Above him stood the 1,063 foot iron lattice work masterpiece known as the Eiffel Tower.

Antoinette was overflowing with excitement as she set out their picnic a safe distance from the feet milling about the base of the tower. The food wasn't anything exceptional by Parisian standards- commoners' delicacies, she'd described it as. And as always, the food was great.

They had just finished dessert when the sun began to set, casting the long shadow of the tower away from them. The horizon, lined in gold and crimson, was obscured intermittently by darkening silhouettes. As the sky grew darker and city lights came on, the tourists began to disperse even though the majority of the crowd remained.

When the breeze picked up and the stars attempted an appearance through the light pollution, they packed up the remains of their meal and left. With the aid of a shortcut Antoinette cut through the city, they made it back to the apartment in record time.

Almost the same time they stepped inside the door, her phone buzzed with the good news of the traveling ballet production. He watched as her jaw fell open and she responded. She told him and he pretended to be excited for her sake. She'd be meeting the other dancers at the theater the next morning and they'd be leaving within the hour the last dancer arrived. Which meant Steve would be leaving tomorrow as well.

And to think...he was just beginning to enjoy Paris.


	11. Negotiations

When the next morning came, Steve could count the hours of sleep he'd gotten on one hand. He couldn't stop the storm of thoughts and emotions that ravaged his thinking. He couldn't even put a coherent sentence together. And he for sure couldn't stop what was coming.

He could only content himself with walking Antoinette to the theatre that morning, watching her converse with her friends in excited phrases he vaguely understood, and waving goodbye as they left to catch their first train to Calais. He could only succumb to the hollow rut of boredom he'd dug before coming to Paris.

He packed the few belongings he'd brought with him and made sure to extract his shield from its hiding place behind the dresser. When he was ready, he sent the message ahead and started the walk back to where the Quinjet had dropped him off. This time, there was a helicopter in place of the jet.

He climbed in and surrendered to the madly swirling half-formed thoughts. More than two hours later, they had landed on the Helicarrier where Dr. Banner stood to greet him. Even seeing his old friend couldn't cheer Steve up. "Director Fury wants to see you," Banner told him after exchanging pleasantries.

"I assumed as much," Steve answered.

He headed for the bridge where he knew Fury's office was located. When he knocked on the door, the director's voice answered, "Come in."

Steve pushed open the door and stepped inside, making sure the door closed behind him. He faced Fury with an emotionless expression and asked, "You wanted to see me, Director?"

"Yes, I did." Fury pushed off from where he'd been leaning on the table and paced his way toward Steve. "I bet you're wondering why I recalled you to the Helicarrier."

Steve nodded, taking a seat at the table. "Yes, sir."

"It's not a short explanation, mind you."

"I want to know."

Fury sighed before continuing, "I underestimated the force that wants the girl. They're powerful enough that we still can't hack into any of their programs or files. We don't even know who they are. But they're a threat now and we had to remove her."

"Not a very long explanation, Director," Steve mumbled.

"I'm not done," Fury replied impatiently. "Because we don't know who it is who wants the girl, we can't stop them. Unless she told you more?"

Steve shook his head.

"You didn't get anything out of her?" Fury insisted.

Steve shook his head again, staring absently at the floor.

"You didn't get any information of use, Rogers? Why did I send you there if you didn't accomplish anything?"

"I was letting her get warmed up to me. She made it pretty clear at the beginning that she didn't trust me so I was just giving her some time," Steve said. "You didn't just send me to extract information. I was sent to protect her too, and I've been doing that job."

"We didn't have time, Captain," Fury scolded. "Time was the one thing we didn't have. It would have been better if you'd gotten what you could out of her by force or deception than 'giving her time'."

"I just-"

"You got emotionally attached, Rogers. And after that happens, nothing good can come of the mission."

"When Barton got emotionally attached, you gained one of your best agents and assassins in the form of Agent Romanoff," he retorted.

"That was different."

"Don't see how it was."

"Barton wasn't sent to help her; he was sent to kill her. Your mission wasn't to befriend the girl. It was to get as much out of her as possible."

"Didn't exactly get that out of the file, Director," he muttered.

"You didn't? Seemed pretty clear to me."

"Then next time, put it in black and white," Steve said with more savagery in his tone than he'd intended. He left the room as quickly as he dared, not bothering to turn back to see Fury's expression.

Without intending to, he let his feet carry him to his bunk room. He locked the door behind himself and collapsed into his bed. When he laid back, he had every intention to think of what had happened and figure a way out of it- some way to see Antoinette again. What he did not plan on was falling immediately asleep.

When he woke up, he had no idea of how much time had gone by but he felt wretched. Not only had he stomped out on Fury, but he'd probably ruined every chance of seeing Antoinette again. He'd have to explain himself to the Director. He slowly stood and rubbed his face to wake himself up.

He left his bunk and headed to Fury's office for the second time only to find it empty. When he turned back, he spotted Agent Hill. "Hill, have you seen Fury? I need to talk to him."

"He knew you'd want to talk. He's in the communications lab," she responded.

"And uh, what time is it?"

"A little after seven," she said, walking away.

He nodded in thanks and started in the direction of the communications lab, at least in the direction he thought it was. When he'd hit two dead ends, he knew he wasn't where he thought he was. Yes, he was aboard the Helicarrier but things had been changed around.

As humiliating as it was, he stopped the first agent he saw and asked directions to the lab. In minutes, he'd found his way and knocked on the door.

"Enter," Fury's voice sounded through the door.

Steve pushed it open and stood to the side, waiting for the Director to speak first.

When Fury spoke, it wasn't with vengeance or with malice but with whatever small amounts of patience he possessed. "I knew you'd come back."

"Director, I didn't mean-"

"Oh I know you didn't. And you'll still see her now and then; I won't deny you that. Maybe you can still get the information out of her."

Steve sighed and nodded before asking, "How often?"

"Once every week or so. But don't worry about her, she'll be plenty busy with the ballet."

"Is she safe?"

"As safe as we can make it."

He nodded again and left the room. When he stepped around the corner to the stairs leading to the top deck, he bumped into Agent Romanoff and Agent Barton. They were discussing something in whispers with their heads bent together and they were covered in soot and dried blood. Probably just returned from an assignment, he thought.

They passed him with nods and exhausted smiles before disappearing behind a door. Steve busied himself in the only way he could think of: training.

He passed the next three weeks beating the heck out of several punching bags. When Fury approached him with a message, he tried to hide his impatience and excitement under a more business like exterior.

"Captain Rogers, there's a Quinjet waiting to take you to ground whenever you're ready. The ballet is currently showing in Calais and that's where you'll be staying the night." His tone became more serious when he said, "You're only checking up on her, Rogers. Keep in mind: the mission is your first priority."

"Yes, sir," Steve agreed. He packed a duffel bag and prepared to leave for the Quinjet before he bumped into Agent Romanoff.

"Steve," she stopped him. "Fury's told me a little of what's going on and...just..." She closed her eyes for a moment to think of the right words. "The best thing for missions like this is to not get emotionally attached."

He sighed inwardly in impatience and replied, "I think I can handle this."

"Trust me, Cap. This can't get any easier, but it can get a lot harder."

"I know," he agreed. "But I also know what I'm doing. I think."

She smirked and nodded a tiny bit. "Alright, just remember what I told you."

He nodded once and passed her, boarding the jet and taking a seat as they began take off. Once they were in the air, he closed his eyes and drifted off for a nap. One side effect of being encased in ice for sixty-eight years and seven months was that his sleep cycle was completely thrown out of whack. There were times when he could catch an hour or two of sleep intermittently through the night, times when he couldn't sleep at all, and times when he would close his eyes without feeling tired at all and wake up eight hours later.

This happened to be a regular nap, and his eyes opened again when the Quinjet came to a halt. He thanked the pilot before climbing off and checking the note he'd been left to tell him where he was going. Fury had booked a hotel room for him by the coastline overlooking the British channel.

This close to England, the thought of Peggy sprang to mind and refused to leave. Even her memory was as stubborn as she had been; and probably still was since there had been no record of her death on file. He had checked the SHIELD files while he'd been aboard the Helicarrier and hadn't found a single trace of Peggy's death which meant she was most likely still alive.

He wanted to visit her but she had lived without him happily for the last seventy years so why interrupt her now? She probably didn't even remember him. And if she did, she would think he was dead. Seeing someone come back from the dead would make people lock her in an asylum and he wouldn't allow that. No. It was better if she just continued as she was.

But if she had stayed in contact with SHIELD after retiring, then she would have heard about the battle against the Chitauri. Even if she hadn't gotten the information from SHIELD, the battle had been all over the news and radio. She would know he was alive.

And if she knew he was alive, she'd be expecting him to visit. So Steve had no choice; at some point or another, he would have to visit Peggy. It would be easy to find her address from the SHIELD database but making himself go would be loads harder.

When he emerged from the depths of his thoughts, he found himself checked into his hotel room and finished unpacking, simply staring out the window at the foggy ocean. It was amazing what the mind could get done while the body does something it doesn't have to think about.

Once he was ready, Steve left the hotel and asked directions to the theater. When he arrived in front of the large brownstone building, he hesitated before going in. It had been three weeks. He had been away from Antoinette longer than they had been together. She probably didn't want to see him after so long. She probably thought he'd abandoned her.

He began to stroll down the wide main aisle in the massive auditorium, dreading when he would have to see her again. The theater wasn't quite as well-kept as the one in Paris but it was larger by far- possibly an old church that had been reused and refurbished. Quiet voices drifted from behind a wooden door that he assumed was the girls' changing room and he leaned beside it with his arms crossed.

After several minutes, the door opened and the dancers poured out, chittering and giggling. Most passed him without notice, a few cast him interested looks, but he didn't see Antoinette. When the last girl had vacated the room, he followed the mob to the street. Still not seeing her, he stopped one of the girls and asked, "Do you know where I can find Antoinette Cousteau?"

The dancer faced him and nodded, " _Oui_ , she is with our instructor."

"May I speak with her?" he asked.

" _Quand_   _elle_   _est_   _fini_. When she is finished," she replied.

"How long will she be?"

The girl shrugged and left him standing in the doorway to the theater. With a deep breath, he reentered the building and took a seat halfway up the aisle to wait. He lost all track of time as he stared absently at the carvings in the wooden framing around the edge of the stage. When at last the door beside the stage opened, Steve's head snapped up to see Antoinette frozen in place and watching him with a cold, guarded expression. Slowly, he rose to his feet.

The way she stiffened and stepped away from him caused him to hesitate. What if she ran away? What if she yelled at him? What if- No, Rogers, cut it out, he reprimanded himself. He began to approach her cautiously.

"Wou- would you like to get coffee?" he asked her.

"What are you doing here?" she demanded, ice lacing her tone.

"I wanted to see you," he answered simply, stopping a few paces in front of her.

"If you really wanted to see me, you would 'ave come sooner," she retorted, brushing past him and hurrying out the door.

Steve took a few quick steps to catch up to her before gently grabbing her elbow. "I couldn't. This was the first chance I got. If I could have come sooner, I would have."

She froze and turned to face him, ocean breeze whipping the thin hairs by her ears into her face. He could tell that the brick wall she'd built around herself when he first met her had been reconstructed and solidly separated them again.

"Please," he added, not quite begging but feeling something very similar.

He could see her expression change slightly before she stared at the sidewalk and nodded. " _Oui_. But it 'as to be quick, the girls and I 'ave a meeting tonight zat we cannot be late for."

He smiled in relief and nodded. "Alright. What time is the meeting?"

"Eh,  _dix-neuf heures trente_ ," she answered, and he actually understood. (7:30pm)

They walked to the nearest outdoor café and ordered their drinks before he accompanied her back to wherever she was going. They talked about the ballet and how things were happening and the next day's showing before she pulled a sheet of paper out of her pocket.

She handed it to him and he unfolded it until the words appeared. It was a list of every stop the circuit was making and every city they would perform in was highlighted. Quite the extensive list really.

Calais, Reims, Dijon, Strasbourg, Lyons, Nice, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Poitiers, Nantes, Brest, Rennes, Le Havre, Troyes, and Paris were all highlighted. Fifteen cities in all that would be hosting a performance of the ballet. The dates scrawled beside each surprised him even more; every week or every other week, a performance had been scheduled in a different city.

"Sounds exhausting," he commented, passing the paper back.

"Keep it," she told him, sipping her steaming coffee. "It will be tiring but it is what we love. I couldn't imagine a more exciting trip."

"What about coming to America to perform? Wouldn't that be exciting?"

"Of course, but there's no chance of us performing in America. We are not zat good yet," she replied. "I will not let myself imagine what will never 'appen."

"You never know," he said. "Maybe someday."

She shrugged and continued walking in silence. When they reached the place where the girls were staying, he told her goodnight and turned to leave. A hand on his shoulder made him turn back.

"Are you coming to ze show tomorrow?" she asked him.

He smiled and nodded. "Wouldn't miss it," he told her.

Her face broke into a grin and she closed the door behind herself. From what he heard, the other dancers ambushed her and began bombarding Antoinette with questions once she was inside. He chuckled and began the walk back to the hotel.


	12. Guérison 1

Author's note: This chapter and the two that follow it are like the montage portion of a movie. So they're going to be formatted a little differently and done in shorter snippets. 

\--------------------

_Calais, April-_

The next morning Steve packed his things and prepared to leave immediately following the ballet performance. Fury had told him not to hang around and he didn't think Antoinette would be fond of that either, so he made sure he was ready. When he reached the theater, he looked around for her and spotted her with some friends.

"Antoinette," he called to her.

She stopped and spun around, startling her friends slightly. "Steve? You actually came."

She sounded surprised. It was written across her face and in her posture as well. The fact that she didn't think he'd really come hurt. He would never break his promise to her, he thought. But guilt gnawed at him when he thought of all the lies he'd told her, the large chunk of the truth he was keeping hidden, and the real reason for his being there. He felt terrible when he couldn't tell her the answer to a question she posed, or explain something she wanted to know. Not to mention it was exhausting trying to hide his past and the whole Avengers deal too.

The weight of it all must have shown on his face because she left her friends and paused in front of him, brow knitted together. " _Est-ce quelque chose de mal?_  Is something wrong?" she asked.

He quickly covered by saying, "You didn't think I'd come."

She cast her eyes to the floor and sighed. "Well,  _non_ , I did not think so. You were gone for almost a month. I thought you would just leave again."

He hesitated before answering. "I'll always be here whenever I can. I promise." He couldn't stop himself; another promise he couldn't keep had slipped out.

A smile slowly crept onto her face as she rose slightly onto her toes. "I will 'old you to it," she said.

The dancers were called away to get prepared and changed so Steve found a seat similar to the position he'd been in when the sniper had attempted the shot in Paris. The seats filled and in time, the lights dimmed and the show began. He got comfortable to watch and spotted Antoinette quickly. Her angel costume was the same, but he could see her visibly check to see where he was. She hid a smile when she picked him out of the crowded audience.

The story played out exactly as it had been in Paris the first time, but when it came to intermission, he stayed in his seat and waited until the show began again. When the time came for Antoinette's solo, Steve felt each of his senses prickle. She made it through the entire routine before he felt satisfied that no one would be shooting at her today. When the solo ended and she exited the stage with the other transformed angels, he heaved a sigh of relief and allowed himself to relax.

The ending of the performance surprised him. The mortal man that had been the cause of the war committed suicide by jumping off a cliff (or at least he thought it was a cliff), and the good angel queen refused to save him because he wouldn't agree to rule with her. At the very end, many of the main characters had died, including Antoinette who was apparently the good queen's right hand. Her death had been the least tragic; she simply fell over a waterfall.

The last lights were extinguished and the applause broke out. The bows began and were over in a minute or two. When the audience was allowed to exit, he met Antoinette by the door to the back room.

"That was great," he told her. "Fanciful, but well done."

She beamed up at him, and he could tell she was thoroughly pleased with the performance. "And no attempts on my life either," she added.

He chuckled. "Nope."

Unable to smile any wider, she released a breathy laugh and twirled in place, positively overflowing with joy. When she'd come full circle, she bounced on her toes with pure girlish excitement. In spite of the burdens weighing on his mind, Steve found himself laughing and smiling with her.

"Antoinette!  _Arrêtez taquiner l'homme_ ," a fellow dancer dressed in green laughed, stepping up to join them. Antoinette's face turned a shade of rose pink that stood out against the shimmery ivory stage makeup. She sucked in a breath and stared at the ground, fighting to hold in her giggles. " _Coupable_?" the dancer in green added, expression teasing and playful.

Antoinette bumped her friend with her shoulder and her face turned a darker pink. "What'd she say?" he asked her.

She bit her bottom lip before answering, "I will..." She glanced sideways at her friend's smug expression. "I will tell you later." He narrowed his eyes in good-natured suspicion before nodding and letting her leave to change.

When she returned to the spot where he had stood to wait, he told her that he had to return to base. Fury had given him instructions to leave out the fact that 'base' for him was the Helicarrier in case she connected the dots and figured out the truth. As soon as she heard, she nodded and bid him goodbye.

_Reims, April-_

Steve was packed and ready before the director delivered the message. When the permission came, he was on board the helicopter and taking off within five minutes. True, he had only seen Antoinette last week, but the time had been so short.

When he arrived in the city, he checked into the hotel and abandoned his unpacked suitcase inside the locked room. The theater was just inside reasonable walking distance, so he set off on the cheery spring afternoon.

This time when she saw him, Antoinette grinned. The performance would be beginning soon so she had no time to chat but he didn't mind. They could always talk afterwards. And when the ballet was finished, he met her backstage to do just that.

As she laughed with her friends in the confined hallway, he picked his way carefully toward her. When they were in Paris, she would have pulled him aside, but now she simply made room for him beside her. What's changed? he thought. She's acting so different. Not  _strange_  exactly, but  _odd_. She was never like this before.

When the other dancers had left them alone together, he spoke first, "Meet me out front when you're finished, alright?"

"Mhm," she agreed before darting away to change.

He left the cramped hallway and returned to the sunbathed sidewalk. A pleasant breeze tousled his hair and tugged at his shirt. The breeze felt great with the warming sunshine and mildly humid air. Today was beautiful and it seemed a shame to waste it, so when Antoinette appeared beside his shoulder, he invited her for a walk with him. She agreed and they set off with no destination in mind. Their only goal was to enjoy the day and each others' company. Steve tried to keep up the conversation and even attempted teasing her at one point, but she balked from any form of discussion. Finally, when she wouldn't answer a harmless question about her ballet friends, he halted and spun to face her.

"What's wrong?" he asked sincerely.

She met his eyes with a hint of obstinance. "Who said anything was wrong?"

"Something's clearly wrong. You weren't acting like this before," he insisted.

"And 'ow would you know 'ow I act? Maybe zis is normal for me? Maybe zis is 'ow I was acting before and you were gone so long you'd forgotten?"

He bit back a snappy answer and reigned his tongue before replying, "Is that what it's all about? My leaving?"

"I never said zat," she clipped.

"Maybe not, but it was implied."

She set her jaw and narrowed her eyes ever so slightly. If this continued, it would become an argument and he'd lose her trust, and friendship for that matter, for an indefinite amount of time. He couldn't let that happen. He sighed and let his gaze fall to the grass at his feet, a vibrant shade of green lined in gold from the setting sun. Running a hand through his hair, he thought over his answer before he said it.

Calmly, he met her eyes and stated, "I never meant it as an argument. I only wanted to know if something was bothering you."

"Nothing is bothering me," she retorted stubbornly.

He held up a hand. "Alright. That's all I was wondering."

He watched some of the tension leave her posture, but she didn't utter another word until she muttered goodnight as she closed the door behind herself when he dropped her off.

The next week passed and Antoinette acted stiffly cordial after their near-fight. He didn't want to make anything worse, but nothing gets fixed with false politeness. Two weeks passed before he saw her again at the end of the second. He was afraid she might start hating him again, but she remained detached. Steve visited her the week after that and tried to ease things back to the way they had been in Paris, but she wouldn't budge.

_Lyon, May-_

With a deep breath, he entered the theater and found a seat. He had been late and was only seated for a minute or two when the show began. He endured the now very familiar production and let his mind wander.

Over the past few weeks, he'd made up his mind that at the first chance he was given, he would visit Peggy. She was currently living in Washington, DC, and Director Fury had agreed to his request when the opportunity came. The director had given him permission to visit any of his former team members but Peggy was the only surviving member. One by one, his team had died from disease, old age, other wars they'd volunteered for, or accidents in their lifetimes. Except for Howard. He'd been murdered, along with his wife Maria, by the V-Battalion in a staged car accident before Steve had been discovered in the ice. Steve had considered his friendship with Howard almost as close as he had been with Bucky, and it was saddening to think that Howard's son was one of Steve's most painful thorns in the side.

But Peggy was alive. He bit his cheek to prevent himself from grinning like an idiot as he thought about it. He couldn't wait to visit her now and he was anticipating the chance when he could remind Fury of their agreement.

If only he could see Bucky again; now that would truly make him happy. But Steve knew that could never happen so he squelched his thoughts before they ran off without reason to keep them in line.

When intermission came and the lights were restored, he blinked in the light with surprise. He'd completely forgotten where he was when his thoughts had swallowed him, but now he stood to stretch and got a drink of water before returning to his place. The lights were dimmed again and the ballet dove into the second half. He paid this half little more attention than he had the first except to keep his senses alert for any danger. When the performance ended, he rose from his seat and waited for Antoinette.

She met him on the sidewalk with the gloomiest expression he'd seen for the longest time. Her eyes darted from his face to the street then quickly to her fidgety hands. Adjusting her backpack straps, tying and untying the braid in her hair, pulling her sweater sleeves down over her fingers- all generally signs of nervousness or guilt. They walked for a short distance before he couldn't hold it in any longer.

"You're acting guilty. What happened?" he questioned, trying to meet her eyes. She refused to face him directly, instead keeping herself aimed at a slight angle away from him and keeping her shifty glances on her feet.

"The instructor-" she broke off and started again. "During the performance..." Another hesitation followed. Steve waited patiently for her to formulate a complete sentence. With a huff, she blurted, "The instructor said I was distracted today and she pulled me from the next two performances. She said the mistake in my solo was unforgivable and-" She had to take a breath before continuing, "And she said if it 'appens again, she will send me back to Paris."

He heard the strain for control in her voice and the struggle she was having to keep herself together. He felt sympathetic but didn't know what to tell her. When she turned her pale blue eyes up to his, they were red around the edges and her eyelashes were wet. He realized with a start that she must have been crying earlier. That's why she wouldn't look at him.

On impulse, he pulled her petite frame into a brotherly hug before quickly letting go. "It'll be okay," he told her. "Two weeks can give you a chance to relax and fix anything you need to fix before going back in. She wouldn't send you to Paris, the show needs you." She smiled weakly and they continued their walk together in companionable silence.

 


	13. Guérison 2

During the next five weeks, he made his visits to Antoinette with complete uncertainty about how he would find her. Would she still be stiff? Or bitter about her withdrawal from the performance? Or distant from him considering how they'd last parted?

When he reached the theater, he was surprised to be greeted by a beaming smile. Antoinette was dressed, not in the attire she would normally have been in if she'd been performing or helping backstage, but in a simple blue dress that brushed the tops of her knees and a cream white cardigan pushed up to her elbows. She'd left her long, blonde hair down and Steve couldn't help thinking that she looked so much more relaxed than she'd ever been before.

He found his seat and she sank gracefully into the plush black cushion beside him. "Must be different watching instead of performing," he said.

She nodded. " _Oui, c'est ça_. It is but I 'ave always wanted to see what it looks like from the audience. Though I would much rather be on the stage."

He inhaled to reply when the lights dimmed and the show began.

_Nice, July-_

Each week came and went much the same as the last until July Fourth, the American Independence Day. Steve woke up with a feeling of confusion clouding his mind until he realized that today was also his ninety-first birthday. He sighed and rubbed his face before sitting up and preparing to head to the ground.

He had no time to meet Antoinette before the performance, but she met him afterwards and he congratulated her on her flawless solo. With the time she'd had off, she had perfected the intricate moves and twists until he almost believed the wings allowed partially sustained flight.

She was so overjoyed that she greeted him with a massive hug, standing on full-pointe and flinging her arms around his neck. " _Je ne le peux pas croire! Elle a effectivement travaillé! Et le solo et l'ovation à la fin et juste oh, Steve, je suis tellement excitée! Je ne peux même pas rester encore_!" She spoke so fast he couldn't even distinguish one word from its neighbors until she rushed out, "And I cannot believe you didn't tell me it was your birthday!"

He chuckled before replying, "I haven't had a chance yet. Wait, how did you know?"

"A little birdie might 'ave let it slip," she said, grin receding to an energized and secret-hiding smirk.

"Does this little birdie have a name?" he asked.

She laughed and shook her head a little. " 'e is just an old friend from my time as an agent. I 'ad 'im look it up for me."

Whenever she got excited or began speaking quickly- both of which were at work here- her accent thickened and the regular English words became pleasantly tainted with the French pronunciations.

"Oh really?" he answered, trying to sound casual. Inside, he was freaking out about how much this friend told her. Had he mentioned anything about Steve's past or the fact that he was an Avenger? If so, the whole mission was blown. "And what else did this friend tell you?"

"Zat you can draw  _tres_   _bien_."

Steve's mind translated this to 'very well' and he nodded. "Yeah, actually. I wouldn't say 'very' but I'm alright; I was going to college for comic illustration. Anything else?"

" _No_ _n_ , 'e said you were boring other zan zat," she replied.

He choked back a short guffaw of ironic laughter; how quite the opposite his life was from boring. "And how about you? Anything interesting you've never told me?"

She glanced up at him in a playfully suspicious way before saying, "Define interesting."

He thought for a moment before answering, "Anything unusual, out of the ordinary, something you don't tell many people."

He let her think of an answer as they crossed a lazy intersection together. When she spoke, he slowed to walk beside her to hear better. "Hm, unusual? I can write with both 'ands. Does zat count?"

He laughed and nodded. "Yeah I guess that is unusual."

"Your turn," she told him.

He was hesitant to continue this game in case she began asking questions he had no way around but until then, he'd try to manage. "Um, have any questions?"

" 'ow old are you today?"

That was a question he was not expecting. Before he could answer, he did rapid subtraction in his head before replying, "Twenty-three. Now I get to ask, right?" When she nodded, he asked, "When's your birthday?"

"Christmas Eve," she replied immediately. She was about to ask another question when they passed a woman pushing a cart of flour sacks. They stepped out of the way and crossed another street to pass into the more relaxed and historic portion of beautiful Nice, France.

As they explored the winding streets, he had no trouble getting Antoinette to talk. In fact, getting her to be quiet would have been a difficulty had he wanted her to stop. She kept up her half of the conversation as well as a good portion of his own half but Steve didn't mind. When dusk began to fall, he could almost imagine the fireworks and parties that would be held all over the United States in a couple hours. He felt so incredibly homesick at that moment that he hadn't realized he'd slowed down until Antoinette had turned back to see where he'd gotten to.

"Steve?" she said, walking beside him.

He shook his head to clear it before answering, "I'm alright. It's just-"

"July Fourth," she said. "I know. I thought you would miss home but I didn't know what to do," she admitted.

"It's okay," he told her. "I knew I wasn't going to be home for tonight anyway. I'll be fine."

"Sure?"

He smiled and nodded, giving her hand an encouraging squeeze and letting go again. She was about to say something when she was roughly shoved into him by a herd of teenagers running down the street and laughing. He caught her shoulders and steadied her before they continued their walk.

"Crazy kids," he muttered good-naturedly.

"If they are the kids, then what are we?" she replied.

He made a face and thought about that. "I'm not sure. Adults maybe?"

"But then we would have to be boring and responsible," she said.

"Not necessarily. Responsibility is good but it doesn't mean we can't have fun."

She laughed a little and guided him down a few streets while they chatted together. The hot summer day acted like it never wanted to end and the sunlight lasted even after 8:30pm. They had dinner at a quaint corner restaurant and stopped again at a café an hour afterward for ice cream.

She led Steve to a bridge spanning a road beneath them and overlooked the breathtaking Mediterranean Sea. The humid air was pleasantly swept away by a salty breeze that tousled his hair and played with the hem of Antoinette's skirt. Her bare shoulders were tanned and freckled from the time they'd spent outside in the recent weeks and her hair was pulled into a bun at the back of her head.

He took a deep breath of the clean night air and exhaled slowly, watching street lights blink on around them as the sky darkened. The sea and horizon maintained a faint glow until velvety darkness set in and enveloped them. Lights from surrounding buildings and streets shed enough of their golden glow for them to see by without being harsh or obtrusive to the night. Stars appeared at first one by one before pricking the sky by hordes of ten and twenty at a time.

It's perfect, he thought, gazing out over the Mediterranean. He felt Antoinette beside him and was about to say something when he felt her fingers intertwine themselves with his. He smiled and glanced down at her but she wasn't watching him. She was staring at the stars above their heads with a far away gaze.

He squeezed her hand gently and felt her squeeze back, reassuring him she was still aware of where she was. He pushed off the stone barrier he'd been leaning on and turned a little to face her more. She snapped back to earth and met his eyes with a quiet smile.

They stood together in comfortable silence watching the sea lap away at the beach until Steve remembered that Antoinette was required back before eleven. He walked her to the apartment where the dancers were staying and paused in front of the steps. She stood on the step above him, still several inches shorter but able to meet him eye to eye without difficulty.

"Happy birthday," she whispered.

"Thanks," he responded just as quietly. The string of lights over the doorway and in the trees framing the steps cast a glow over them as they stood together. No matter how he tried and what reason was telling him, he couldn't make himself leave.

He expected her to be called inside by another dancer or to retreat up the steps; but if there was one thing he knew about Antoinette, it was that she was never what he expected. And again she surprised him.

In a single quick but graceful movement, she rested her hands lightly on his shoulders and kissed his cheek before pulling away and backing up a couple steps so that he had to tilt his head back to meet her eyes. He couldn't be sure in the dim lighting but he had the good idea she was blushing.

" _Bon nuit_ , Steve," she told him before disappearing inside the building.

He was left standing at the bottom of the steps and smiling at nothing. When he finally released the breath he didn't know he'd been holding, he felt lightheaded and a little dizzy. He turned away not knowing where he was going but managed his way back to the hotel without getting lost.


	14. Guérison 3

The next few weeks, Steve felt like he was walking on air. He ran into scheduling issues at Toulouse and Bordeaux and wasn't able to take a long walk with Antoinette afterward but when they arrived in Poitier, he made sure to have the day free for an afternoon together.

_Poitier, last week of July-_

He met her after the performance after being locked out for arriving late. She was surrounded by a mob of her fellow dancers but caught his eye over the heads of the others and mouthed 'wait'. He nodded and leaned against a wall, smiling.

When she returned, she was dressed for the humid day in a lacy white skirt and floaty pale blue blouse. When she spotted him again, she said goodbye to a friend who winked in response and left them alone together.

"Ready?" he asked.

She nodded, beaming. "I can't wait! I've heard there's a battle sight from the Frankish war against the Moors. Do you think we can see it while we're here?"

"Of course," he said. "Lead the way."

She hooked her arm through his and started down the street with a skip in her step humming the Yellow Brick Road song.

_Le Havre, last week of August-_

"Steve!" He spun around to the sound of Antoinette's voice calling to him across the bustling crowd of people. She was still in her silky blue dress and stage makeup with her hair pulled into its usual bun. A bundle of white roses was held in the crook of one arm while the other was flung around his neck.

After her solo, the crowd had applauded and cheered for an encore until the show had to keep moving. During the final bows, the applause had been deafening and the dancers were obliged to return twice. Even from his seat towards the back of the auditorium, he could see her smiling ear to ear.

He hugged her in return, lifting her an inch or two off the ground. She giggled when he set her down and bounced lightly on her toes. Rambling in French, she stopped her bouncing and began gesturing wildly, expounding upon whatever she was saying.

After a while he held up a hand to stop her, smiling and laughing. "Go change and I'll surprise you when you come back," he told her.

"Oui," she agreed, disappearing into the crowd and returning when the theater had cleared out some. The scent of roses hung around her and reminded him of Pvt. Lorraine's heavy perfume. He wouldn't let the unpleasant memory dampen his spirits though and held the door for her as they left.

She was still overflowing with exuberant energy as they started down the street. She was so distracted, she almost walked out into traffic as cars zipped carelessly by. He caught her elbow and pulled her back in time, laughing a little at the oblivious state she was in.

"So you said you had a surprise for me?" she prompted when they had reached a path that stretched along the shore by the English Channel.

He smiled and nodded. "Fury says that he's been asked if it's safe for the ballet to travel to America to perform."

Her eyes widened and all her energy was focused on the idea of being able to tour the States. "And?" she encouraged, almost breathless.

"It's safe. He's given his permission and the ballet will be touring in America starting in February."

She gasped and released a little squeel of joy accompanied by a bout of giggles. "I'm going to America!" she exclaimed, face lit with spirited excitement. "I'm going- to- the ballet is- I can't believe-" Her outburst ended with another wordless vocalization of emotion.

"Ya know," he teased. "I wasn't sure if you would like that or not but I took a chance and-" He was cut off when she hugged him so tightly he had trouble breathing. While he hugged her in return, her arms squeezed around his waist tighter and tighter until he was forced to pry her off. He chuckled and walked beside her as she skipped lightly down the street, hardly the public deportment for a well-known performing artist.

When they had drained every second they were allowed together, he walked her to the hotel where the dancers were staying and told her goodnight. She smiled in return and replied, "Goodnight, Steve. And thank you."

"For what?" he asked.

She stepped up toe to toe with him and tilted her head back to meet his eyes. "I'm not sure. Everything...I guess."

"Then you're welcome...I guess," he said, teasing her again.

She smiled before stepping away. As she twisted the door handle, he remembered what Fury had told him and called out, "Antoinette, wait."

She turned around with a questioning expression and he hesitated. "Nevermind," he told her. "I'll ask you next time I see you."

"Is it-"

"It's nothing to worry about," he interrupted. "I promise."

There were those words again.  _I promise_. It seemed that more and more often every promise he made was impossible to keep. He couldn't stand lying to her like this but he had no choice. SHIELD had backed him into a dangerous corner that would fall out from under him at any second. It tore him apart inside to know that he was keeping so many secrets from her but there was no other option.

"Alright," she said. "If you are sure."

"I am. Goodnight," he answered.

"Goodnight," she said softly, turning to go.

This time he let her, stuffing his hands in his pockets and kicking a pebble as he walked. She didn't trust him. It had been written all over her face when she turned away. She didn't trust him. After all they'd done together and every situation they'd been thrown into,  _she didn't trust him_. He wished there was some way to know for sure what would be the right thing to do. Being as unpredictable as she always was, Steve didn't know if it would help to tell her the truth. And if she didn't trust him, it would all blow up in his face sooner than later. There was no way out.

When he'd returned to the Helicarrier, he came across Agent Romanoff. They exchanged friendly nods but passed each other before he had a thought. "Natasha?" he said, spinning around to face her. "Can I ask you something?"

"Just did, so I'd say you can," she replied smoothly.

"Um, I kind of need help with something," he began awkwardly.

"The girl?" she asked, smirking a little. "I thought you were just getting information out of her?"

"Well, that's the problem. I'm supposed to be asking her all these questions and wringing answers out of her," he explained. "But every time I see her, I can't bring myself to do it," he finished.

"Because you got attached," she answered simply. "Just do it the next time you see her. Set up the conversation so there's an opening or just be honest with her."

The words 'honest with her' reverberated through his head and made him feel guilty. As if there were little comic strip people all pointing fingers at him and pushing his lies back in his face. "But-" He couldn't finish his sentence because he didn't know what he was trying to say. He wasn't sure how to put it into words. If it could be put into words at all.

"But you're afraid to push her away," she summed up.

He nodded, staring at the floor. When he looked up again, Agent Romanoff was smiling sympathetically but with a hint of amusement.

"Before you say it, she's unpredictable," he explained.  "I never know what she's going to do next and the smallest things set her off some days.  I don't know what's wrong and she won't ever tell me either.  She's stubborn as a brick wall and knows how to weasel out of any situation."

Natasha raised an eyebrow and said, "She's a girl.  All girls are like that at times. And she's probably confused."

"Confused? About what?" he asked.  "What could there be to be confused about?"

She laughed lightly before answering, "Just think about it."

"But what if-"

"Steve," she stopped him.  "I have to report to Fury but if you have more questions, find me later alright?"

He nodded and let her go.


	15. Return

Steve was kept on the Helicarrier for a week longer before he was allowed back to the ground in Paris. It was another day before he could see Antoinette again and when he did, he was surprised. In the short time he'd been away, she'd already changed again.

He slipped into the familiar auditorium and sat to wait for the lights to dim. As far as he knew, Antoinette was unaware of his presence in the audience and he wanted to surprise her. But when she set one foot on the stage, he knew she was distracted by something and he didn't think it was him.

Throughout the entire ballet, she seemed slow, behind, not as mentally focused on the performance as she had been the numerous other times he had seen her dance. When the ballet was finished and the applause finally died out, he stood and fought his way through the crowd to find her. He searched the back room, keeping his eyes peeled for Antoinette's long blonde hair and bubbly enthusiasm.

After wasting fifteen minutes scouring a room she wasn't in, he left and stood outside the door off the atrium the girls used to change. Steve didn't have to wait long when the door opened and she slid out, clearly preoccupied in thought.

He tapped her on the shoulder lightly and waited for her to turn around with that brilliant smile that could appear so easily and disappear just as quickly. But when she pivoted to face him, her brows knit together and she bit her bottom lip nervously. She glanced around the heads of the crowded space before grabbing his wrist and dragging him away from the theatre.

He allowed himself to be tugged through the sidewalk traffic for a block and a half before she released his wrist and paced worriedly three strides back and forth in front of him. Few people traversed the spot where they stood so he didn't have to worry about keeping an eye out for those she might bump into.

"What's going on?" he asked.

She buried her face in her hands and shook her head before digging into her teal backpack and drawing out a crumpled piece of paper with bent edges and a strip shredded from the side. "I found it  _cette_   _matin_ , this morning."

Steve smoothed out the paper and began to read the choppy writing. Every word seemed to be written by a different person so that the handwriting changes made the note difficult to decipher. There was no greeting or date or signature at the bottom, only the menacing message centered on the battered paper.

_We know you're being protected because you cannot escape us on your own. Now that your petty adventure is finished, your precious soldier will be eliminated and we will have you again. When something is taken from us, we will retrieve it. We will give you no peace until we get our way. So the decision comes to you: find us and make a trade? or die and allow us the chance to invent all kinds of cruelty for your friend. Speak a word of this to anyone, and we will make your soldier's death as slow and painful as we know possible. You know how to find us- you've done it before, we're sure you can do it again. What will it be, Flower? An innocent trade or death to the one left you truly care for?_

Steve read through the threatening letter twice before handing it back to Antoinette. She appeared on the verge of a mental breakdown and he subconsciously prepared himself to catch her if she passed out.

"Tell me who this is from and I'll have Director Fury send in a team as soon as he can spare it," he told her, trying to meet her eyes.

She avoided looking at him directly and instead stared off over his head or to either side of him. "I- I can't tell you," she stammered.

"And why's that?" He kept his voice level and calm, controlling his volume to stay just below regular speaking volume so she wouldn't have reason to worry more. If he hid the fact that he was freaking out on the inside, she might calm down enough for him to draw the information out.

"They'll kill you. And it'd be all my fault and I can't let that happen  _parce_   _qu'il_ -"

"English, please," he reminded her.

"Oui. I mean yes," she hastily replied, beginning to pace again.

He followed her with his eyes as she traced the same path repetitively on the sidewalk. The rhythm of her steps seemed to help soothe her nerves and order her thoughts until she was able to breathe regularly and speak in English without odd French words being thrown into the mix.

"Please understand, I just can't tell you. Everything would be  _exponentielle_  worse."

"Then tell me what's happened," he said, trying to form a loophole that could sneak its way under her stubborn brick wall.

"You already know," she answered, beginning to get riled again. He couldn't risk her losing her sanity so he reached out and gently rested a hand on her shoulder.

"I want to help. SHIELD-"

"Non!" She swiped his hand away angrily and her pale eyes took on a stormy quality. "Don't you  _comprendre_?! I can't tell anyone! And I especially can't tell you, Steve! They'd kill you  _et_ -" her voice broke and she resumed her pacing at a maddened tempo, shaking her head and ranting in French.

He was so startled that she felt so strongly for him that he didn't know what to say. He could barely string together two thoughts. "You- I didn't- you don't-"

"Oh, Steve,  _tu_   _chèvre_   _inconscient_! If you haven't noticed by now that I care for you, then you of all men are blind."

"But..." He couldn't think. She didn't hate him after all.

She began to rant in French, and he let her get some of that steam out before interrupting.

"English," he reminded gently.

She heaved a massive sigh and sank to the sidewalk with her knees slightly extended and her hands covering her face again. He knelt on the hard cement beside her and slowly lowered her hands so he could see her facial expressions.

"Antoinette." She continued to stare at her knees. "Hey." She blinked rapidly and made the tiniest twitch to lift her head to meet his eyes. "Look at me," he said softly.

Slowly, she lifted her eyes to meet his and a shiver ran down his spine. Her gaze wasn't strong and defiant as usual, or excited or thoughtful. Instead, she was broken, exhausted, emotionally drained. The most frightening though- he could already tell she had given up, surrendered.

He supported her to her feet and kept a reassuring arm on her shoulders in case she still ended up passing out. Her eyes hadn't left his face and now he was beginning to see a change. "Come on, you need to sit," he said, leading her along the familiar side streets and narrow city roads until they had arrived at the apartment.

Steve unlocked the door and let her in first, locking it behind them and clearing the building. He'd hidden his shield in its spot behind the dresser the previous night and wasn't worried about her finding it by chance. And if she wasn't suspicious in all the time they'd been meeting, she wouldn't start looking for clues now.

Antoinette kicked off her sandals at the door and sank heavily onto the sofa, letting her backpack slide to the floor with a muffled thud. Steve joined her, perching on the other end of the couch and watching her carefully. The first movement she made after being entirely still for three minutes was to let her hair down from its bun and comb it out with her fingers. She then pulled it into a loose braid that fell over her shoulder and allowed some pieces to fall out to cover her ears and frame her face.

She folded her hands into her lap and stared fixedly at them for the longest time until she finally spoke. "I don't want to endanger you."

"I've gone to war. Danger is the most familiar thing I know."

She sighed and replied, " _D'accord_. I should probably start at the beginning, shouldn't I?"

He nodded, allowing her to start comfortably in her own timing.

When she spoke again, her voice was soft but strong without any hint of shaking. "When I left SHIELD, I was still on an assignment to keep an eye on a girl in the ballet. In fact, you've met her. Diana Krushov, a Russian girl from Moscow. She was alerting SHIELD for whatever reason and I was given the task of simply keeping her in line. But when I caught her sending encrypted messages to Moscow, I stole a few and deciphered them. The information was...inestimable, priceless. I thought, maybe, if I could collect enough to report back to Fury and foil the plan then maybe, he'd allow me to continue working for him and only taking missions that kept me near Paris so I could continue ballet. But Diana caught me. She found the stolen messages in my backpack and reported to whomever she was sending them to. Soon, I was receiving threats and being followed. It lasted for about two months before you came. And it all ended abruptly, no more threats, fewer followers."

"What did you learn that was so vital?"

She inhaled and her breath caught. "It was about my parents. The reason the extraction team never came is because the Russian ground team had set a trap and diverted the extraction team to a different location entirely from where my parents were. By the time the team arrived, it was too late."

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

"But there were other things. Secrets, not just Russian but from several countries and agencies that were angry with SHIELD. Most I don't even remember. The ones I do remember are no longer relevant. But they still want to punish me for what I did learn. And in doing so, they would pull SHIELD secrets from me as well. I can't let that happen."

"What's the name of the group?" he asked.

She shrugged and shook her head a little. "Something in Russian. I'm not sure. Something about the ocean I think."

"Alright, I'll call Fury in the morning to tell him. But while you're here, I promise you'll be safe."

There were those words again:  _I promise_. This would be the hardest promise to keep yet. There was no way he could ensure her safety while she was here, or at the theatre, or in Paris, or anywhere for that matter. If a strong enough force attacked, he couldn't even be sure he could keep anything or anyone safe.

 


	16. Mémoire

Just before Steve could set his keys on the counter, a rapid knock startled him. Who could that possibly be? Antoinette stood in the hallway in the bedroom door with an anxious expression. "It's alright, I have an idea who it is," he assured her.

She responded with a tiny nod before watching him with wide eyes as he opened the door. Three energetic blurs darted inside the door and attacked Steve with massive hugs.

"Monsieur Steven!" they exclaimed, voices mingling into one mangled sound.

"Whoa now, calm down," Steve admonished, chuckling.

"You're back!" Jerome exploded, jumping in place.

Antoinette smiled and joined them kneeling on the floor. Jason greeted her with a wide smile that revealed a lost tooth.

"Does your mother know you are here?" she asked the boys.

Jean nodded enthusiastically, answering, "Oui, she told us to invite you both for dinner so we came running over."

"Oh," she said in surprise. "How did she know we were here?"

"She was watering  _l_ _es_   _fleurs_  et saw  _Monsieur_  Steven closing ze door."

Antoinette nodded a little and glanced over the heads of the boys to meet Steve's eyes. He shrugged a shoulder and nodded. Why not? This family meant them no harm, so dinner couldn't possibly be a terrible idea.

She smiled in return and rose to her feet. "Well then we accept your invitation to dinner."

Jason grabbed Antoinette's hand and led her down the steps and across the street to a house with colorful flowers beginning to lose their petals in the window boxes. Jerome sprinted after his brother and Jean followed quickly behind, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Steve was following.

At the end of the night, when the boys' mother had offered Steve and Antoinette as much as they could eat and it was time for the boys to go to bed, they thanked her for the meal and left, crossing the street in the velvety September night.

Antoinette paused on the second step to the front door and stared at the cloudy sky with a wistful expression. He let her stand like that for half a minute before she snapped back to earth and entered the apartment.

He followed her in and locked the door behind them, setting his keys on the counter and removing his bomber jacket. He smiled to himself when a thought passed through his mind. She must have seen his expression because she asked, "What are you thinking of?"

He chuckled and said, "Madame Chevalier reminds me of my own mother every time she's got that spoon."

"Why? Were you punished a lot as a child?" she asked, laughing a little.

"Not really," he replied. "Just threatened. Anytime I needed discipline, I wouldn't be hit, instead my mother tickled me. Quite effective."

She laughed again and removed her sandals before stepping into the kitchen. When she returned with a glass of water in her hand, she stopped in front of him. "What are you smiling about now?" she asked.

He hadn't realized he was smiling and quickly changed his expression. It'd been a while since he'd heard her laugh like that- honestly laughed- and it had sounded nice. It was a light melodic sound that lessened the burden on his shoulders he'd been carrying for the longest time. The burden of all the lies he'd told her, all the promises he'd made and couldn't keep, the guilt he felt by not telling her the truth and having to hide so much that weighed him down.

With a start he remembered he hadn't answered her yet which would make her suspicious and suspicion led to questions, so he simply answered, "Nothing, just another memory."

She smiled a little and turned back to the kitchen to rinse out her glass and dry it. While he waited, he sank onto one end of the couch. When she returned, he expected her to take the other end of the couch or drag in a chair or perch on the coffee table, but she surprised him and took a seat close to him on the couch with her legs tucked up beneath her.

"You 'ave never told me about your parents before," she said, taking her braid out and pulling her hair over the shoulder opposite him. He was still amazed how long it was compared to Peggy's short, dark waves. She combed her fingers through it and wove it back into its loose braid that tied off a little over her waist.

"I guess I haven't," he replied.

" _Alors,_ what are they like?"

He had to think before answering. It had been more than seventy years since he'd seen his parents and he hadn't thought of them much since he'd been thawed from the ice. "My dad was gone a lot in the army but my mom always said I was exactly like him."

"And your mother?"

He smiled at the rush of fond memories that flooded his mind's eye. "Protective, firm, loving. She was more relaxed than Madame Chevalier but there are some definite parallels."

"They sound wonderful," she said smiling. "Maybe I can meet them when I come to America?"

His countenance fell and he saw a look of confusion pass over her face. "I wish you could but my dad died in the war when I was young and my mom died of pneumonia when I was nineteen."

"I'm sorry," she whispered, lacing her fingers through his.

He forced a smile and squeezed her hand in response.

They continued talking and recounting fond memories together until they fell asleep on the couch, Antoinette tucked close to Steve's side.

When he began to regain thinking ability in the morning, he was immediately aware of several confusing factors: his neck was stiff, he was on the couch again, and only his left side was warm. He mumbled something incoherent to himself and opened his eyes.

The sight of Antoinette curled beside him with her head resting on his shoulder brought back the rush of memories from the previous night- including his promise to call Fury. All reason told him he needed to get off the couch and inform the Director as soon as he could, but a stronger voice in his head told him not to disturb Antoinette.

For the first time in a long time, she looked truly at peace. Over the summer, she had always been hyped on all the adrenaline of performing or worried about the next performance, and before she had always been worried about being attacked, or trying to get rid of him.

But now.... he felt odd watching her sleep but he couldn't bring himself to wake her. Just as he made his decision to gently rouse her out of the peaceful slumber, her nose twitched as if she were about to sneeze. He hesitated and she shuddered slightly before releasing a yawn and peeking her eyes open.

When she spotted him, she looked confused before smiling and letting her eyes open the rest of the way. "Good morning," she greeted, voice cracking between a whisper and regular volume.

He smiled in return and replied, "Good morning. Sleep alright?"

She pushed up onto her elbow and shrugged a little. "Well enough."

Once she got up, Steve was able to stand too, stretching his arms behind him and then in front to relieve the stiffness in his back. When he glanced at the couch, she was staring intently at the floor with her hands folded in her lap. He found himself staring and shook his head to snap himself away.

Call Fury, he reminded himself.

He walked toward the kitchen where he'd hung his jacket over the back of a chair the night before. He searched the pockets with one hand until he found his phone, dialing the number Dr. Banner had programmed to lead directly to Fury's comm piece he always had with him.  
Steve had only to wait a handful of tense seconds before he heard Fury's gruff reply on the opposite end. "This had better be important, Rogers."

He kept his voice low so it wouldn't travel to the living room for Antoinette to hear. "It is, Sir. Antoinette's told me why she's being hunted. Apparently, she found some secrets from a Russian agency that had a grudge against SHIELD. She said the secrets weren't just about Russia but other nations as well. She's forgotten most of them and she says the others aren't relevant any longer but they're still bent on killing her."

"Did she give you proof these secrets are valid?"

"I trust her, Sir. She was distraught when she found a threat letter yesterday and her story has no gaps. Everything fits together, so either she's telling the truth or she's the best actress I've ever seen."

"She's a spy, Rogers," Fury replied, sounding as if this call was turning into a waste of his time. "Acting is her job. I want proof."

"Alright, but she said the name of the group was something to do with the ocean."

"Wanna give me more details, or just leave me with that piece of useless-"

"She said she didn't know any more- it was in Russian."

On the other end, Fury swore so heavily Steve held the phone away from his ear and bit the inside of his cheek. "I know what group she means now," Fury said, sounding aggravated. "They're not just in Russia but worldwide and if that's who we're dealing with then there's no hope of her staying in Paris until this is cleared. Should've seen this coming," he added the last bit to himself.

"Director? Is she in any immediate danger here now?"

"She could be. We received a threat as well but didn't connect the dots until now. It sounds like they've planned an ambush."

"An ambush? When?"

Fury snorted in amused frustration before replying, "Do you honestly think they'd be dumb enough to tell us? It's not an ambush if we know when they're ambushing us."

Steve rolled his eyes and answered as calmly as he could. "I meant are there any supposed times that would suit best for them or anything suspicious?"

"Not this group. They leave no hints and only make a move when it's least expected."

"So what now?"

"Just keep her out of harms' way, I'll send backup into the city but don't do anything stupid. And remember, Rogers, don't get attached."

Steve hesitated before answering, "Yes, Sir," and hearing a click. He lowered the phone from his ear and closed it, replacing the device to his jacket pocket.

When he returned to the living room, Antoinette was watching him with a curious expression. Her eyes seemed to penetrate his skin and see through him to the inside, searching for answers she knew he wouldn't give. Her jaw was set and the angle of her posture told him she was about to ask something he'd rather not answer. True enough, when she parted her lips to speak, he dreaded what would come. "You answer directly to Fury. Who are you to SHIELD that you're allowed to bypass all other agents and speak with the Director himself about what would seem a not-so-important mission?"

Steve swallowed uneasily. How could he possibly answer this? He didn't want to lie to her further but there was no other way. He could tell her the truth....no- that would ruin everything.

"I'm exactly who I told you I am. A member of SHIELD, a soldier, no one special."

"But 'no one special' would answer to Coulson, or Hill, or Cale, but never to Fury directly. You're far above 'no one special' if Director Fury is on speed dial. You're not telling me something."

He felt his palms tingle and cold fingers prodded the back of his neck. "Like I said, just a member of SHIELD. Director Fury wanted me to answer to him and never gave me a reason. There's nothing more than that, I promise."

And again. _I promise_. He wanted to cut out his own tongue.

The only thing that hurt more than lying to Antoinette was the fact that when he met her eyes, he realized she trusted him. She thought he was telling the truth.

"So..." She began and then paused. "Am I safe here? Or will we leave again?"

"Fury says it's alright as long as we lay low."

She nodded with a half hearted smile. "There's a post-performance rehearsal tonight and tomorrow but the night after there's nothing happening. Would it be alright if we tried the catacombs again?" She offered him a hopeful look with begging blue eyes.

He nodded. "Yeah. I don't see anything dangerous in that."

The post-performance rehearsal was mostly the teacher giving the dancers a long lecture in throaty French that Steve thought sounded like beautiful gibberish. He sat in the balcony where he could see every other seat and doorway in the auditorium as well as Antoinette on stage below. The time passed slowly but he was alright with that. It gave him a chance to think of any possible way he could tell her the truth about who he was without her returning to hating him again.


	17. Chaos

After the second post-performance rehearsal, Steve held the door for Antoinette as they left the theatre and paused on the sidewalk. She stood patiently beside him while he took a deep breath of the crisp, autumn night air. The temperature of the air itself was still warm enough to be comfortable without being overbearing but the constant breeze was chilly enough to surprise him each time it blew across his bare forearms. Antoinette had donned his jacket only a minute before to cover her thin blouse she'd thrown over her black leotard; to cover his arms, he unrolled his shirt sleeves and rebuttonned them at his wrists before offering her his elbow with a smile.

She accepted by curling her elbow through his and allowing herself to be pulled closer to him with a teasing smile. As they began to meander the criss-crossing streets of the city, the clear night air helped Steve organize his muddled thoughts and partially relieved the guilt he'd been feeling the past few days.

She hadn't asked any more prying questions but also hadn't acted entirely like she had before their argument. He wanted to tell her the truth, he really did, but he knew it would make things so much worse than they were now. At times, he had to bite his tongue to stop himself from blurting out everything to her just to relieve the massive burden resting like a pure lead block on his shoulders.

He looked toward the sky, wishing there was less light pollution so he could see more stars but it was a city, and cities had lights, not stars. He sighed and ran his free hand through his hair, letting the breeze tug parts of it this way and that. When he returned his gaze earth-ward, he caught sight of Antoinette watching him.

She smiled sweetly and fixed her backpack strap on her shoulder before resting her other hand on his forearm and leaning her head on his shoulder. She tried to stifle a yawn but failed, closing her eyes and gripping his arm tighter as she did so.

Time to get her back to the apartment, he thought, turning down a street that would lead the way they wanted to go. When she noticed where they were headed, she mumbled, "Not yet."

"You're exhausted," he protested.

"Not yet," she repeated, sounding more like her good stubborn self. "I like this."

"And what's 'this'?" he asked with a chuckle.

She shrugged with the shoulder not leaning on him and replied, " _Je ne sais pas_. I don't know. Just...this."

He smiled and changed their course to extend the walk for another ten minutes before he could feel her feet beginning to drag. Without any protests, he led her back to the apartment and watched as she collapsed onto the sofa still cuddled into his jacket.

Steve found himself yawning as he quietly carried a kitchen chair into the living room and sank into it. Before he could begin the familiar path of thought through his worries, he was drifting asleep into a nightmare he had never wanted to experience again.

_Steve's hands shook with the adrenaline pounding through his veins. He couldn't fly this thing! There was no way he could stop the Hydra ship- it wasn't really a plane the way he knew planes- from wiping out America. He felt hopelessness and despair settle in the cockpit as he struggled to put the ship off its course. The scenery slowly changed and he felt the air coming through the bullet holes in the metal shell begin to drop in temperature. At this altitude though, that meant nothing. Then he realized..._

_He would have to force the jet into the ocean before it hit land._

_With an almighty lurch, he aimed the jet for where the ocean might be and felt the shift in gravity. He tried to prepare himself for impact but then Peggy's voice reached his ears. At first he believed he was imagining things but no, she was there. Not on the jet with him of course, but communicating through part of the complex gadgetry on the dashboard before him. And she helped. Not that what she said had any effect but hearing her voice had all the effect in the world._

_"And don't you be late," she told him, holding back the tears that were so clearly evident in the way her voice cracked._

_He tried to reply but he'd been distracted and hadn't realized the proximity of the jet with the ground. He didn't have to be dreaming to know what came next. Crash._

He jerked bodily in the chair and sat forward with a start, wide awake. His breathing was quick and ragged, as if he'd really been on the Hydra jet just mere minutes ago. The stillness of the room did nothing to help his shot nerves until a gentle hand rested on his tense shoulder.

"Steve?" Antoinette's voice asked quietly.

He whipped his head around to meet her eyes but found that he couldn't and looked away, staring intently at the floor. "Nightmare," he muttered, trying to still his shaking hands.

"What about?" She crouched beside the chair and slipped a mug of coffee into his hands. Wisps of steam curled from the black surface and tickled his nose with the inviting aroma.

"Just..." He found it difficult answering her, not because he was loathe to lie to her again, though that was part of it, but because he'd never told anyone about the crash.

"If you don't want to say, it's alright," she said, preparing to stand.

"No. It's fine. Just something that happened in the war- a jet crash."

She bit her lower lip and nodded a little before standing and staring out the window. He followed her line of sight to a tree across the street whose leaves were beginning to turn brown around the edges. The summer was gone, tomorrow would bring the first day of October, and the mission was almost over. Once Fury had had his way, Antoinette would be safe and he would be recalled to the Helicarrier for some other mission.

With a sigh, he rose to his feet and took a swallow of the hot coffee. It helped somewhat but not much.

He realized that Antoinette was already showered and changed and had her backpack propped against the sofa near the entrance to the hallway. The catacombs. Of course. He'd completely forgotten but there was no way she would forget. He finished his coffee and showered as well, changing into fresh clothes and splashing cold water on his face to wake himself up more.

Once he was ready, they were on their way to the catacombs.

The whole while, Antoinette kept her chatter to a pleasant amount though he could tell she was bursting to rattle on and on. He could also tell she was doing it for him. He now was feeling the beginnings of a headache throbbing against his left temple and loud or obtrusive sounds were making it worse.

When they finally reached the entrance to the Parisian catacombs, Antoinette grinned. They were open and few people stood around. Before he knew it, Steve was following her underground into an ancient burial sight housing millions of skeletons.

A narrow circular staircase wound down and down and down until opening into a dark, twisting tunnel. The place smelled of earth and damp stone but that was to be expected. It took a while for his eyes to adjust, and when they did, what he saw was nothing spectacular. Just walls of stone carving their way deeper underground.

As he and Antoinette followed the winding tunnel, he couldn't believe this is the place she'd always wanted to visit. It was unpleasant at best and really not somewhere he'd ever want to visit again. Soon, they came to a plaque of sorts that read  _'Arrête! C'est ici l'empire de la Mort!'_

"Stop, here lies the empire of death," she translated for him.

"Wow, couldn't have found something a little more morbid, could they?" he muttered sarcastically.

She plunged on, past the threatening plaque and into a chamber walled with skulls and long, thin bones. Steve could have surrendered his breakfast to the empire of the dead right then but he held back his revulsion and concentrated on not making eye contact with the empty sockets of the skulls. He felt as if he were constantly being watched; as if those black holes in the carefully placed skulls were following him as he walked.

He was careful to place his feet where there was no chance of him accidentally kicking or stepping on a loose bone. He could already imagine himself barely nicking a protruding shin bone and creating a grotesque skeleton avalanche. Nasty.

As they journeyed further into the mass grave, the skin on the back of his neck began to prickle and goosebumps ran across his arms. If he were to rate this place on the creep factor, he'd give it a perfect ten; on the decor, not so much. He took as deep a breath he could of the dank, stale air and forged on for Antoinette's sake. She, at least, was enjoying herself and would halt frequently to stare at a pile of skulls or a design made of mangled vertebral columns.

The dim lights of the meandering tunnels were only making his headache worse and all his senses burned in the hushed, cramped spaces between larger exhibits. After a while, he found he had acclimated somewhat and his headache eased as long as he didn't look at the struggling lamps above them. Often, he had to duck to avoid hitting his head on a low hanging lightbulb strung on an extension cord twenty feet from the next light.

Each bulb provided just enough illumination in the tight tunnels to make the paths passable. When you passed through the artificial pool of light, there were always two steps of utter, impenetrable blackness between bulbs that made Steve nervous every time they stepped through one. He always felt as if something was waiting in the shadows and would jump out and scream Bah! at any second.

In a more deserted portion of the catacombs, Antoinette got excited about something and sped up her pace in anticipation.

"What's the rush?" he called to her.

"There's a major exhibit just around the corner and I want to see it," she replied.

"Alright. Don't get too far ahead," he advised, watching her disappear around the bend in the earth tunnel. As soon as she was out of sight, he felt a chill pass through him and he knew something was wrong.

"Antoinette?" he called, slowing his footsteps. "Can you come see something? It's in French and I can't read it."

No response.

His brain wanted to hit the panic button but he took a deep inhale and held it long enough to get himself under control before releasing it again. Cautiously, he rounded the corner and took a step into the circular chamber. As soon as he was three feet into the room, he felt something hard and cold pressed between his shoulder blades.


	18. Guerre

"Move, and I shoot," growled a voice behind him with a thick Russian accent.

The shadows to the left shifted and a man dressed in black left his hiding place, holding Antoinette with a glinting blade pressed to her throat. Her head was tilted sharply backwards and the knife had already begun biting into her skin; a thin trail of scarlet led from the knife tip to her collarbone.

Steve met her terrified gaze and slowly raised his hands in surrender. "What do you want from me?"

"It's not you we want, Soldier," the man holding Antoinette answered. "It's your precious Flower. She broke the rules and must pay the consequences. So we offer you two options: attempt to save your sweetheart and both of you die here in the catacombs, or you let us take her and we allow you to live. What will it be?"

Steve's training couldn't help him now as much as weighing the sacrifices and cons- mainly because there were no pros. He felt the tip of the gun dig between his shoulder blades harder, forcing him into a decision. He was never a good negotiator but he'd have to try.

Then something occurred to him; Antoinette had chosen a path through the tunnels with only one exit. She must have known something like this would happen and planned ahead for it. He felt a surge of admiration but kept his face void of all emotion. The slightest tip could kill them both.The man restraining Antoinette dug the knife deeper into her skin and she cried out in pain. 

With a jolt, he made his decision. "Take her."

The men both grinned maliciously and the leader pocketed his knife. The pressure from the gun point left his back and the man behind him crossed the cavern to the leader's side. Antoinette stared wide eyed at Steve in horror and it broke his heart to do this to her but he had to keep up the bluff.

The man with the gun kept it pointed at Steve until both men and Antoinette were racing down the tunnel. In his head, he counted down from ten before following, sneaking through the shadows and keeping the trio in sight.

The men shoved her roughly along until they came back to the original cavern. Few citizens and tourists were in the catacombs now but with the gun directed at them, they took immediate cover. As soon as the men had disappeared up the staircase to the open air, Steve chased them at top speed, pouring all his energy and anger into his footsteps as he pounded methodically up the winding stairs.

When he reached the surface, people were scattering in every direction to get away from the man with the gun. But now there were at least a dozen more thugs in black all handling guns with experienced, trigger-ready fingers.

A bang from behind Steve startled him and soon, searing pain shot across his arm. Confusion was the first thing he felt, but when he realized the bullet hadn't hit him, only grazed his bicep, he plunged into the fight.

The nearest man in black made the mistake of charging him head on. With a quick kick to the ribs and a hit to the jaw, the man skidded across the pavement and Steve scooped up his gun. The pair of assailants who thought they'd have a go next began to back up quickly but Steve grabbed one man and used his momentum to send them both into a nearby parked car.

When those two were dealt with, three more charged him and he began to fall back. Across the street, he could hear Antoinette fighting as best she could, screaming insults and curses at her captor with the feisty sort of spit fire attitude he'd come to enjoy. When one man landed several punches to Steve's head, he lost sight of her.

A commotion down the street to his left caught his attention and he found himself facing a very welcome sight. "Forget something, Cap?" Agent Romanoff asked, tossing him his brightly painted shield.

He allowed himself a brief moment to nod to her in thanks before bashing the nearest man in the head. Just as they had in New York, he fought side by side with Natasha until the throng of men surrounding them began to thin. "I've got this," she told him, knocking two men backwards over each other. "Go find her."

"Thanks," he said, forcing his way out of the circle and racing down the street to where he'd last seen Antoinette. He rounded the block and paused before noticing a blood trail leading to the right. His stomach plummeted but he tightened his grip on the shield before following the trail at a dead sprint.

When he passed into a more open space, he caught sight of Antoinette and her captor immediately. He was dragging her backwards, kicking and fighting with everything she was worth. Steve was convinced this would be easier than he thought when she spotted him and shouted his name.

Everything went downhill when the man in black halted and whipped his head around. With the shield strapped to his arm, Steve wasn't exactly hard to spot, and when the man saw him, the world slowed.

Antoinette began to fight with renewed vigor and managed to break free but only briefly. Her captor grabbed her from behind and plunged the knife hilt deep into her ribs. Her eyes widened and she doubled over, choking.

In a split second decision, Steve pulled the shield from his arm and flung it toward the man, chasing after. The man didn't duck in time and the shield caught him in the forehead. Steve reached the pair in time to catch up his shield and slam the man in the chest, throwing him backward across the asphalt.

After the initial surprise, the man in black began to fight in return, far surpassing his minions in both skill and strength. In several quick minutes, Steve felt like he'd been run over by a construction truck but the other man showed it more. Both were bleeding heavily and gasping for air as they grappled in the street.

Finally, Steve managed to retreat ten feet before flinging the shield again and taking out the assailant's legs. The next two hits to the head forced the man unconscious and he fell to the pavement, motionless. Heavily, Steve sank to his knees.

Antoinette.

He spun around and dashed across to where she was lying on the pavement, hand pressed to her wound. Dark blood seeped from between her splayed fingers and her entire body shook. The cut on her throat was no reason for real concern but a line of blood led down from her temple, probably from an injury she sustained while struggling.

When he bent beside her, she gasped and tried to scoot away, fighting to stand. "It's alright. I'm not going to hurt you," he told her, so beyond confused why she was acting like this.

"Get away from me!" she screamed at him. When she could reach a traffic light pole, she hauled herself to her feet, gasping with the effort. Every move she made caused her agonizing pain and she wouldn't be able to stand for long.

When he reached out to help her, she swore at him in French and lashed out with a bloody hand.  "Antoinette? It's just me," he tried to plead with her but she wasn't listening.

"Just you?" she exclaimed, "And who are you? Clearly not who you 'ave been saying you are! I can not believe you lied to me! You  _lied_  to me!" Every sentence cost her precious effort and she collapsed to the ground again.

He knelt beside her but she swore at him again. "I'm just- I-" he stammered.

All the lies he'd told her, all the promises he'd made, all the decisions he'd made for the better at the time, all the warnings he'd blown off- they'd all blown up in his face. He felt like someone had clamped a vice on his throat. He couldn't breathe.

"I never-" he began.

"Never what?" she gasped, clutching her ribs. "Told me ze truth? Why couldn't you 'ave told me at ze beginning you were Captain America? From ze beginning, you could-" she had to stop and fight for air but she'd already lost so much blood.

She was fighting just to keep her eyes open and he knew he had no other choice but to scoop her into his arms. She tried to fight, tried to protest, but she didnt have the energy anymore.

With his left arm under her knees and the right behind her back, her head rested against his shoulder and he lifted her off the ground. The spot where she'd been was dark where her blood had spilled onto the sidewalk. He tilted his arm slightly so the shield would protect her head and stepped carefully back the way he'd come.

Halfway down the block, Agent Romanoff intercepted him and took one look at Antoinette before saying, "Hospital's this way."


	19. Désespoir

He sat in a chair, staring mindlessly at an invisible point on the wall while a nurse bandaged his arm. Most of his other scrapes and bruises had healed but the bullet wound hadn't stopped bleeding until now.

But none of that bothered him. In fact, he was numb. All the precautions he'd taken, everything he'd done to prevent this from happening had backfired. Every promise he'd ever made had blown up in his face and now she hated him.

He should have told Antoinette the truth while he had the chance. And now it was gone.

As soon as they'd reached the hospital, Antoinette had been rushed to the ER and Romanoff had sat with him for awhile. Her silence had been appreciated, but now, after she'd left without giving a reason, he desperately wanted someone who could give him any amount of advice. Agent Romanoff's advice would be quite welcome this time.

When the nurse finished, she left Steve alone and he rubbed the stiffness from his neck. But the injuries from the battle weren't the worst of the pain. The guilt that had been hovering above his shoulders since spring had finally come crashing down.

_It was all his fault._

If he'd only told her the truth from the beginning, they wouldn't be here now.

He shook his head and rested his elbows on his knees. He sat like that for the longest time before Agent Romanoff appeared soundlessly in front of him. She'd mumbled that she'd left to call Fury and report what had happened but the call had taken longer than she'd expected.

"What did he say?" he ventured, not entirely wanting to know what the Director said.

She sat beside him before replying. "He's glad we wiped out the threat but...he's irate that you risked Antoinette."

"I-"

"I know. But he doesn't . If you'd like to talk to him yourself, he might understand but I don't suggest it," she advised.

Steve nodded and exhaled the breath he'd been holding to keep himself calm. He couldn't talk to the director about what happened because then he'd have to reveal that he got attached. And then there'd be a steep price to pay for directly disobeying orders by taking Antoinette to the catacombs. Not to mention his bluff that almost got her killed.

He ran a frustrated hand through his hair and gritted his teeth. Nothing. He could say nothing to Director Fury that would solve the problem of getting attached and disobeying orders. He could say nothing to Antoinette to make her hear reason; that he'd done everything for her sake. But now that everything was nothing too.

Now more than ever, Steve wished he'd never taken the jet into the ice. But he couldn't change the past no matter how much he wished he could. What was done was done and he could only fix what was in front of him now. Taking a deep breath, he steeled his resolve and stood.

"Where are you headed?" Natasha asked.

"Nowhere. I just need to move," he replied in a clipped tone, beginning to pace the hallway. The rhythmic sound of his footsteps on the white tile helped bring his thoughts into subjection. He just had to keep things under control until he could talk to Antoinette, but he didn't know how long that would be. When his arm began to ache, he ignored it and continued his pacing until the hallway quieted and he was fighting to keep his eyes open.

When he could stand it no longer, he took a seat and fell asleep almost immediately. The opening and closing of doors woke him and he rubbed his sore arm, feeling the bandage beneath the fabric of his shirt. He then rubbed his face wearily before rising to his feet.

He hadn't been standing for long when the door to Antoinette's room opened and Nat stepped out. When she saw him awake and on his feet, she froze and swallowed, wiping her previously worried expression clear. "Steve, she-"

His heart plummeted and he felt numb. "What? She's not dead. Is she?"

"No, but-"

"Then I can see her?"

She sighed and closed the door behind her. "The doctors want her resting and they think that seeing you might-" She broke off and tried again. "They don't want her to-"

"Natasha, what did she tell you?" he gasped, unable to keep it in.

She shook her head. "I'm sorry. They wanted details of the fight for the record and while I was telling them, she woke up. She asked where you were and I told her and she-" She paused again. "After calling you a few not so pleasant names, she asked me to keep you away."

He felt an even heavier weight settle on his mind. "She won't let me explain, will she?"

"I don't suggest you try," Natasha replied softly. "She seemed disturbed." After a long moment of hesitation, she asked, "What went so wrong? She seemed fine before. What happened to make her hate you?"

He sighed and rubbed a hand across his neck. "I- I don't know. I just...I wanted to protect her. I was supposed to keep her safe and now-"

"But what happened?"

"I didn't tell her about the Avengers. I was just trying to get her to trust me so I didn't say anything about the Helicarrier or the Battle for New York, or-"

"Being the Captain," she finished.

He nodded. "Yeah."

She seemed thoughtful for a few minutes as they stood in front of the door before she set her hand on the door again. "If she refuses you, don't push it, alright?"

Steve nodded, a gaping pit of anxiety opening up inside his chest. When he took the first few steps into the room, he knew immediately his cause was lost. Antoinette was fast asleep, resting against the pillows behind her. Her hair was loosely braided over one shoulder and the blankets had been pulled up to her waist. An empty chair was positioned beside the hospital bed and he sat, watching her face.

She looked tortured; her skin was pale and she was trembling slightly. Her breathing was slow but every inhale was quick and sharp. When he gently took her hand in his, her fingers were freezing.

"Antoinette," he whispered. No reaction, not even a twitch. He sighed and gave her hand a light squeeze. And there he sat for the rest of the day, not moving an inch unless the doctors asked him to. But he never left the room; not once, just in case she woke while he was gone. When exhaustion overtook his iron resolve, he let his head roll onto his chest and he sank into a vicious nightmare.

 _Steve_   _kicked up the stand on the motorcycle and took off, weaving between leafy trees and thick trunks. The sound of the engine was unnaturally loud in the empty forest, but he knew he wasn't alone; his men were hidden in various bushes and tree stands along the way, ready to shoot HYDRA agents out of the path._

_He sped along the predetermined trail and reviewed the carefully laid plan in his mind. But before the memory could finish, he was transported to the streets of Paris, sprinting after Antoinette and her captor. He was never going to make it in time. He could feel his feet pounding the pavement, but he wasn't moving. He tried running harder, faster, anything, everything- but the harder he struggled, the further away Antoinette got._

_Just as he broke free of the invisible bonds, he was holding the shield on the train in the mountains. Bucky was clinging to the door, dangling over the open ravine. Steve leaned over the door to grab hold of his friend, but Bucky wasn't there. Instead, Antoinette was gripping the train door. When he offered her his hand, she shouted at him to get away. She called him a monster, an enemy, a plotter... a liar._

_Despite what she said, he reached further and attempted to grab her hand. Just as his fingers closed over her wrist, she released the bar and her hand slipped through his fingers._

He woke with a start, breathing heavily but otherwise alright. When his eyes darted to Antoinette's face, her eyes were open and she was watching him with so much hatred, she could have burned him and not hurt him as much as she was now. "I thought I asked your friend to keep you away?" she hissed.

"I had to know you were alright," he mumbled lamely.

"I am fine. Now leave," she said.

"Let me explain," he begged.

Her expression became icy and he felt the temperature of the room drop. "Non! Everything you told me was a lie! Why should I listen to more?"

"Please, I did it to protect you-"

She swore and it startled him. "Protect me? Much good that did!"

"It wasn't supposed to happen like that," he muttered.

"Oh really?" she scoffed. "What was supposed to happen? Was I supposed to die? You abandoned me in the tunnels and then suddenly you're Captain America! Was anything you said true? Or was it all lies?"

"No. I didn't- it wasn't- Antoinette, please-" he pleaded, failing to formulate whole sentences.

"Non." Her voice broke and she transferred her glare from his face to the ceiling. "I don't want to hear it."

"Even if I swore to tell the whole truth from the very beginning?"

"Oui. Just leave,  _s'il vous plaît_ ," she mumbled.

Steve knew she was serious when she used the formal tense. So she no longer considered him a friend.

Wearily, he stood and hesitated, praying she'd make a last second decision to call him back, but it never came. He left the room and passed the doctors without a word, meeting Natasha in the hallway. He shook his head and led the way out of the hospital.


	20. Retribution

He followed Natasha off the helicopter and crossed the deck of the Helicarrier in silence. He was vaguely aware of the active deck attendants and agents around him but he didn't care. When they finally reached Fury's office, Nat stood in the corner with her arms crossed and her eyes locked on the floor. Steve could only stare into empty space as the director chewed him out for everything that had happened. 

"I can't believe the incompetence!" he shouted. "Two of my best agents and the entire event is plastered on every news channel, every radio station, every newspaper's front page. Normally I would dismiss the agents involved after taking their badges and wiping the record, but-"

Steve didn't even notice when Fury had stopped shouting until he rubbed his temples and leaned over Steve's seat. "Have you heard anything I've said?"

"Yes, sir."

"Rogers, I gave you strict orders and you not only directly disobeyed and attached yourself to the mission, but also lied about what was happening."

Steve met Fury's eye briefly before staring at the table again.

"And clearly, the repercussions of your actions don't bother you at all," Fury continued his rant.

"I've paid for what happened already. I know the consequences. I've felt the repercussions," Steve countered. "There isn't anything more you could do to tell me I was wrong. Believe me, if I could go back and change it, I would."

Fury straightened, apparently satisfied. "Dismissed."

Steve pushed away from the table and left the room in a controlled rush, desperate to be gone from Fury's sight. When he reached the room allotted to him for brief stays on the ship, he sank onto the mattress and stretched his neck. The Director had mentioned that they would be dropping him off in New York tomorrow, so he didn't bother unpacking.

He sighed and began filing the report for the record of missions. Every time a detail was required about Antoinette, he offered it freely, from her past and the murder of her parents to everything of importance that had happened in Paris and on tour, to the scuffle in the catacombs. There was no reason for him to hide anything now.   
  


Plans to leave him in New York had changed, and after two weeks had passed aboard the Helicarrier, Steve had run several easy, mindless missions. He felt himself yearning for real work. Just when he thought Fury would give him a tough project, the Director summoned Steve to the observation deck.

"Captain," he greeted, turning away from the command center.

"Director," Steve replied, somewhat curtly.

"I have a project for you in Washington. The file is in Commander Hill's office."

"Yes, sir," he accepted, getting up to leave.

"And Rogers?" Fury called him back.

"Sir?"

"Do it right this time," the director finished, shooting him a pointed look.

Steve hesitated in the doorway before taking the route to Commander Hill's office. When he knocked on the door, it slid aside immediately. 

"Oh, Rogers, yes," she said, sounding surprised.

"Something wrong, ma'am?" he asked, following her into the office.

She shook her head. "I didn't think you'd come this soon." She paused and looked up from straightening some papers on her desk. "This is about the Washington mission, isn't it?"

He nodded and watched as she opened a drawer and pulled out a tablet. "Steve," she said with her voice thick with warning. "Be careful with this. And please, keep it solely as a mission."

He narrowed his eyes but nodded respectfully and accepted the file. When he returned to his room, he turned on the tablet and opened it. As soon as he saw the picture attached, he swore and set the tablet down beside him. On the front page was an image he'd never forget- the same photo of Peggy he'd cut out and put in his compass. The title in bold letters at the top of the page spelled  _Zodiac._

As he read through the file, he knew that his only job would be to get a report from Peggy telling what had happened that night she left the office a year after he'd gone in the ice. But why were they sending him? They knew his relationship with her. They knew what could go wrong. So why him?

As he read further through the file, he realized why they needed him. Peggy had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and couldn't remember many of her older friends and acquaintances. SHIELD was depending on Peggy's memory of Steve to trigger other memories and hoped to gain access to the night she went after Zodiac. Maybe it would work, maybe it wouldn't, but he'd have to try.

The file included a departing time of later that evening, so he packed a small duffel bag with everything he would need and headed to the mess hall for dinner. Since it was so early, few people were eating, but the few that were had chosen seats spread across the room. Steve got his food and took a seat at an empty table where he opened the file again. After he had reread it three times, he stopped himself. He wouldn't do this again, not this time.

This was just Peggy, right? He'd known her for years. But a nagging voice at the back of his skull whispered 'people change'. The voice was right, he knew, but that didn't stop him from still imagining Peggy as the lively woman he'd first met in '42. He could still clearly recall his first memory of her in boot camp.

 _He stood at attention in line, several inches shorter than the other soldiers and stretching to make an attempt at compensation but failing. A well-dressed woman in uniform approached them from the right, posture displaying control and_   _authority._

_"Recruits, attention!" she snapped. "Gentlemen, I'm Agent Carter. I supervise all activities in this division."_

_"What's with the accent, Queen Victoria? Thought I was signin' up for the US Army?" A brawny man down the line spoke out, slurring his words with a confident accent._

_"What's your name, soldier?" she asked, stopping in front of him._

_"Gilmore Hodge," he drawled._

_"Step forward."_

_He glanced cockily to either side before saying, "Ooh, we gonna wrassle? 'Cause I've got some moves I know you'll like." With a slow step, he stuck one foot forward, chuckling. Before Steve could blink, Hodge was on the ground, picking himself up from a blow that left him snuffling blood._

Maybe she was still Peggy the way he remembered her or maybe she wasn't. But he wouldn't know until he saw her. And if he was honest with himself, he wasn't sure he wanted to see her.  
Much of the flight to Washington was spent floundering in memories that tried to pull Steve in and swamp him. He had no control. If the memory came, he relived it in the fullest detail he could conjure and felt the entire emotional zip line ride that went with it. From every day he'd seen Peggy in bootcamp, to the last time he'd spoken with her as the jet crashed into the ice, if the memory contained Peggy, it rose to the surface and demanded attention like kids begging for candy.

_Huffing and wheezing, Steve slowed to a stop behind the troop of soldiers as their commander spoke. He could barely hear the challenge issued to them over the asthmatic rattling of his own lungs, but when he saw the troop charge the flagpole and begin to climb, he understood. One after another, the exhausted soldiers failed to reach the flag. A few wasted minutes told the commander that the attempts were futile._

_"Fall in!"_

_Steve couldn't make his feet move, but his eyes darted between the base of the flagpole and the truck waiting nearby. Peggy was watching him. He was weak and breathless, but she was watching him. And that was all the motivation he needed._

_"Rogers, I said fall in!" the commander shouted again._

_Somehow, his brain persuaded his leaden feet to carry him toward the pole. Without the other soldiers' boots cluttering the space, the answer was easy. Steve pulled the pin and watched the pole fall to the ground. Just a few more steps. He bent and pulled the flag off, folded it up and set it in the commander's hands._

_"Thank you, sir," Steve gasped, taking his promised seat in the truck beside Peggy. From behind, he saw her turn away, a smile lingering on her lips._

"Captain Rogers, we're landing soon. I suggest you be ready." The pilot's voice snapped him out of his reverie and set him solidly back on earth. But not his earth, not his home- just a 'man out of time' as Loki had put it. And the worst part was knowing there was no way back.

With a jolt, the jet landed and bounced again before slowing to a stop. Steve stood with his bag over his shoulder. "Thank you," he told the pilot. The man saluted him before Steve descended the ramp and was led to an awaiting taxi.

The taxi drove to a special care home for the elderly and he tentatively stepped out. A cord inside him twinged. Would he be here if he hadn't crashed the plane? Would he be here with Peggy? The two of them old and wrinkled together? Possibly married? 

No. Stop, he told himself. He couldn't think like that. This was a mission and he had to treat it as such.

With careful steps, he approached the front desk. Nervously, he swallowed, cleared his throat, and said, "Um, hi. You might be expecting me?"

The lady at the desk turned in the swivel chair to face him. Just like everything about the reception area, she seemed crisp and clean. From her pale green scrubs to her neatly braided blonde hair, she was collected and organized.

"Good morning." She smiled cordially and picked up a pen from the desk. "What's your name?"

"Steve Rogers."

The pen tip moved down a list of names and back up again. "I'm sorry. Your name isn't here. Are you visiting a resident or making arrangements?"

"Visiting."

Her smile widened. "Oh good. There's too few visitors through here nowadays. Who are you visiting today?"

"Um," he stammered. He wanted to say Peggy Carter, but was that still her name? Had Peggy been married during the years he'd been frozen? But the receptionist was waiting for him to speak. "Her name is Peggy, but I'm not sure of her last name."

"Well, you're in luck. There's only three Peggys in the building. Is she a relative?"

"A friend," he replied. More than that, or at least, she used to be more than that, he thought bitterly.

The receptionist gave him an odd look before her smile returned. "Do you know anything about her that might narrow it down?"

"She was part of the SSR during WWII and her maiden name is Carter," he offered. "She might have a British accent."

The receptionist smiled again and nodded. "Peggy, yes, okay. Her last name is still Carter, if you'd like to know. She's on the third floor in room 382."

"Thank you," he said, smiling once and heading toward the stairs. With every step, his nerves spiked and dipped. His thoughts raged between Peggy and the mission and what it would be like to see her again after all these years. When he at last reached room 382, his hand moved to knock of its own accord.


	21. Oublié

"Come in," ordered a man's voice from inside.

Steve hesitantly opened the door and stepped onto the patterned tile floor. A man was bent over a nightstand, exchanging a pot of dead flowers for a new bouquet. Upon seeing him come in, the man nodded and left. Now, Steve was left to look around the room. It was large enough to allow helpers and occupants to move around, but excess space was lacking. A bed took up most of the space in the center and a nightstand stood to either side. The stand closest to where he was held the cheery yellow lilies, and the other showed various medications and a styrofoam cup of water. The walls were a warm shade of beige and offset the stark white of the sheets and pillows. 

With sheets covering her nightgown to the waist and her hair spilling onto the pillow, Steve thought he had the wrong room. Until she saw him and a smile spread across her aged face. He could never forget her smile, or the way her eyes squinched at the corners. "Peggy?" he said, unsure of himself.

"I thought I told you not to be late," she replied.

Steve stood, stunned. At first, he wasn't sure she was thinking properly until her voice returned to him from so so many years ago.  _'Stork Club...and don't you dare be late.'_ The sound and the memory and all the emotions that had gone with those words came rushing back to smack him in the face. He had to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from losing the last shreds of sanity.

"I still don't know how to dance." He'd said the first thing that came to mind, and was glad he had. Peggy's smile doubled and she laughed a little.

"I'm not quite sure I can still teach you." Her accent was just the same as he remembered it, and he could detect that wit and charm that still managed to demand his respect. After a long silence, she spoke again. "They'd told me you were alive. Director Fury came to me, and he said they'd found you frozen in a block of ice. At first I didn't believe him, but his doctor friend- oh, what's his name?- he explained what had happened and said you had been perfectly preserved in a comatose state. And I still didn't believe him. I'd given up hope, and now, here you are."

Those few words ripped out Steve's heart, tore it to bits, burned what was left, and stuffed it back in his chest. He didn't know what to say. "I'm so sorry-"

"No," she cut him off firmly. "You did what you had to do to save a country. You made the right choice." Peggy sat forward and began to cough, choking for air.

Quickly, Steve stood and reached across for her water. He set the edge of the cup against her lips and let her drink until she waved him away. After he set the cup down, he took his seat and waited until Peggy was breathing regularly again. She turned her head to face him and froze. Her eyes widened and her face split into a smile. "Steve? Oh, it is you. I never thought you'd come."

At first, he was confused, then he remembered what he'd read in the  _Zodiac_  file about her memory fading and the Alzheimer's. "It's me," he said. "I couldn't just leave my best girl, could I?"

She reached over and took one of his hands in both her own. They felt so fragile, so unlike the hands that had shot down Hydra agents in the war, so unlike the hands that had held the gun to shoot his shield. So unlike Peggy. His brain found it difficult comprehending that this woman, lying here in such a delicate, feeble state, was the same woman who had fought alongside the soldiers. This was the same woman who had proven men wrong and joined the army. The same woman who had helped defeat Johann Scmidt and bring down his attempted reich.

Time is both fondest friend and cruelest enemy, he thought. Peggy pulled him out of his own head when she pointed at the notepad in his other hand. "What is that for?" she asked.

He looked down at it, momentarily unsure himself. " _Zodiac_ ," he mumbled. "Peggy, I have to ask you some questions for Fury. Is that alright?"

"Hmph, and I'd gotten my hopes up that you would draw me something. But go ahead, I assume he's given you no choice."

After hearing her reply in such a way, he felt wary in asking. Did he have a choice? Could he set it aside and simply enjoy the time he was allowed to visit with her as he would have under normal circumstances? No, he couldn't. This was a mission after all, and he had to follow through.

"I'll be brief. And when I'm done, I'll draw you anything you like."

"Ask away," she commanded.

Steve nodded and uncapped the pen in his hand. "Do you remember the night you got a call about a year after the war was finished? You were alone at an office, finishing some reports when your supervisor's phone rang."

Peggy shook her head mutely.

"That's okay, but stop me if it comes back to you."

"Not much comes back to me anymore." Her voice was thin and wistful, but strangely bitter. "But those pretty blue eyes of yours are the one thing I've never forgotten through the years."

Taken aback, he stammered, "P-Peggy, are you- are you sure you want to answer these?"

"Yes," she firmly replied.

With a shoulder-raising breath, he set the pen to paper again. "Do you remember anything about  _Zodiac_?"

" _Zodiac_ ," she mused. "I don't think so. It's Chinese, isn't it?"

He sighed. "No, uh, it was a project you worked on. That was the title-  _Zodiac_. I need to know what happened that night if you can think of anything."

When she shook her head, her silver hair streaked in darker shades of grey shifted across the white pillow and fell around her wrinkled neck. "I don't know it," she muttered. Her eyes stared at the ceiling without truly seeing. "I don't know, Steve, I don't know. There's nothing there-"

He was capping the pen and drawing a pencil from his pocket when she spoke again. "Steve? You came back?"

His eyes flew up to her face and his own countenance melted into despair. "Yeah, I did."

"But they'd said you'd been killed," she protested.

Steve sadly shook his head. "No, I'm very much alive." Except that every time they had to start over killed another small piece of him inside. If this went on too long, there wouldn't be much of him left but an empty shell.

Stuffy silence filled the room with the scent of the lilies beside him, but Peggy was never one to remain quiet for long. "I don't think we'll be having that dance."

"I don't think so either. I'm sorry."

"No. Don't you be sorry. There are no sorrys in war when a leader makes a valiant decision to sacrifice for the good of many. Steve, don't you ever be sorry for what you did."

Her response was so strong, so heart-felt and passionate that for a moment- a fleeting second- he saw Peggy as she had been in '43. There was a peculiar scratchy feeling in the back of his throat and his eyes were oddly wet. With a broken clearing of his throat, Steve put his pencil and paper away.

"Are you leaving?" she asked.

Just her tone cracked him in half. He couldn't do it. "No, I'm not," he tried to reply evenly.

Standing and pushing the thin chair toward the wall, he closed the door and bent over Peggy's bed so he could scoop her aging frame into his arms. As gently as he knew how, Steve lifted her up and let her silver head rest on his shoulder. "Peggy?"

"Yes?" she croaked.

"Will you still teach me how to dance?"

White lips pursed, she nodded. Slowly, following her instructions in clumsy movements, he found himself dancing around the room with her. Of course, this wasn't what he had imagined his dancing with Peggy would be. He had always imagined a youthful woman, strong and capable, brunette hair, red lipstick, that tempted smile that betrayed how much she enjoyed the moment despite the shell she showed to everyone else. In the warm room in the nursing home, with the heady scent of lilies masking the less pleasant smells of cleansers and medications, Steve and Peggy danced. No, it wasn't the Stork Club. There was no music. He was still tripping on his own leaden, unskilled feet. But they were dancing.

Time seemed to stand still to allow this peaceful moment. Time was a fickle thing. It was time that had defeated their plans, time that had stolen away Peggy's strength, time that had chiseled the tie between them. But the Fates' golden strand could not be cut if time refused to spill sand into the lower glass.

"Why now?" Peggy asked, knowing he would understand.

"Because I promised you a dance. I've broken too many promises recently and I don't intend to let this one pass me by without being fulfilled. I promised my girl a dance."

Eventually, Steve wondered if he was sick or poisoned. The room was blurred and distorted. "Steve," Peggy rasped. "You're crying."

A clear, dewy drop landed on Peggy's laurel wreath of silver hair. "I guess I am."

"Why?"

He would not avoid the truth. Lying and aversion had cost him a valuable friendship in Antoinette, and he refused to lose his one friend from the war- the one friend that actually understood the pain and sorrow of the heart. "Because I loved you, Peg. I did, and I wanted to say it. You mean the world to me. Duty demanded I crash the jet. I almost didn't." His tears were coming faster and streaking down his face. "But when Howard put you on the radio, I knew it was what you and Dr. Erskine would have known was right. I couldn't deny it, neither could I have risked the lives of thousands of innocents for my own selfishness.

"I loved you. I loved who you were and how you were. You needed no assurance or validation from anyone. You were strong and beautiful and innovative and everything America stood for. You were freedom and exceptionalism. You did what no woman had ever done, and you vowed to do it better than any man and never stopped until you did. You were perseverance and grace, face under pressure. I only wanted to be half of who you were and that was with the help of the serum.

"Peggy, you were the most amazing person I had ever met. And I loved you."

For the longest time, there was no reply. Then, with creaking like hinges that hadn't been oiled since he first tried to enlist for the army, her shoulders shook and she began to sob into her nightgown. When he laid her on the bed again, she continued to cry, spilling diamond tears onto the pillowcase. "Steve, Steve," she repeated again and again. A little longer passed and she gained control of herself. At last, she looked up and met his eyes. "You came back."

His eyes heavy with sadness and despair, Steve nodded. "I did, Peg. I made you a promise."

And so the visit continued until a nurse came to show Steve out and put Peggy to sleep for the night. In the chilly, velour air of the outdoors, he tugged his jacket around himself and plodded away, head stirred and swimming.


	22. Tourmenté

A Quinjet brought Steve to the Avengers Tower in NYC and he took a moment to look around. Towering structures, honking horns, wailing sirens, blinking brake lights- all so familiar and yet so strange. With a deep breath, he choked on the fumes of a diesel engine and old brakes. So unlike the warm bread and fresh coffee aromas of Paris. "Welcome home," he muttered.

Sighing, he turned to go inside. Instead of taking the elevator, he trudged down the stairs with the purposeful steps of a regret-laden man.

"Welcome home, Captain Rogers," Jarvis's robotic voice greeted. "Company is waiting for you in the bar."

"Thanks, Jarvis, but could you let them know I might be awhile?" His words were emotionless and weary.

"Of course, sir."

Closing his eyes, Steve rested against the wall of the stairwell. Everything had gone so wrong. He'd lost Peggy, then Antoinette, then found Peggy, just to lose her again. His friends were dead. His closest friend's son was Steve's personal thorn in the flesh, and even his home- New York- had become unrecognizable.

For the first time, Steve wished he had died when the jet crashed. He wished SHIELD had never found him in the ice, never thawed him from his cryo-coma, never uprooted him from the forties, never tarnished the heroism of his sacrifice by bringing him back to life.

People could call him an Avenger, a fighter, an enforcer of justice, protector of the earth, defender of the innocent and helpless, The Captain, a hero- but it meant nothing if his actions were undeserving of praise.

In Paris, chasing Antoinette and her captor, he felt like the villain. He'd let her believe that he was willingly giving her to them. How could he do that? How could he have caused so much damage and chaos? How could he have endangered so many people?

He sat on the top stair of the flight and hid his face in his roughened hands. He'd screwed everything up. It was only luck that Antoinette was even alive after being stabbed in the ribs. And all because he'd wanted to keep her friendship. Was he just doomed to live alone? Would everyone he cared about hate him- or die- and his life just never end?

What if that was a side effect of the serum? That he couldn't die? He hated the idea of living forever, but surely an enemy could kill him in battle. Surely a proper shot could end this ceaseless torture.

He couldn't let himself dwell on possibilities. Standing, he lifted his bag to his shoulder and gripped his shield. The gaudily painted weapon had been a nuisance to keep hidden, and it had been the wedge between himself and Antoinette. As he descended the last few stairs to his apartment inside the tower, he shook his head and cursed his own weighty failures.

Half-heartedly, he kicked the door closed and began to unpack. Dust covered many surfaces, but it seemed as if Pepper or Jarvis had come through to clean a few times. The window shades were drawn together, blocking out the city and its haphazard lifestyle, and also causing the sunlight in the room to be greatly diminished. The jet lag and darkness got the better of Steve's tormented mind and he fell asleep.

Halloween was a raucous nightmare, Thanksgiving was a guilt-ridden day followed by a stressful weekend, the first snowfall was a dismal affair. He found no joy in the holidays or the happiness of those around him. For the sake of the team, he put on a happy demeanor that didn't reach past his false smile and fake laugh.

When he was certain no one could see him, he would sit alone and contemplate the concerns that had plagued him. Steve had but to close his eyes in the briefest blink to see again the anguish on Antoinette's face when she learned the truth. And she despised him. Her hate for him and who he really was had been incomprehensible.

Sometime in November, he understood. Antoinette was the embodiment of purity. She was not simply pure in appearance or personality, but pure in her loves and her interests. She was purely confused, purely excited, purely angry; purity shone through her smiles and laughs, the way she would stand toe to toe with him and just stare- stare with eyes of purest blue. Above all, she had a pure passion for ballet and dance. When her pure friendship with Steve was ripped in two, she hated him with a pure hatred.

She was not just pure, but ardent, adamant, unwavering. She hated him and always would, he'd decided. There was no solution, nor would there ever be.

For Steve, the week leading to Christmas was as absent of cheer and merriment as the holiday had been for Ebenezer Scrooge. The only difference was that Steve's depression was not caused by hatred and bitterness. He spent countless nights sitting around a coffee table with his team, sipping spiked eggnog, listening to meaningless chatter, and often excusing himself early. Why rain on the sunshine of others?

At last, during the Stark Christmas Eve Bash, Steve thought he might stay the usual length of time. The party was just as loud and drunk as all of Tony's other parties and events, but instead of heavy rock music, soft Christmas carols played on the speakers. Humming to some crooner's classic, he watched the faces of the guests around him.

Many of the women had blonde hair and blue eyes, but none were petite and gracefully clumsy like Antoinette. He had long since stopped seeing glimpses of her around corners and in empty rooms, but his eyes still searched for her in crowds. If only she was there with him, perched on a barstool beside him, her back straight and shoulders back, head high, with her chin tipped up as was her habit. He could imagine her laughing at something a drunk partier had done, then eagerly retelling him the scene. For a moment, he was happy with this brief mirage, some trick of the dim lights that his brain had brought to life.

Antoinette's outline vanished when Natasha sat beside him and set her glass on the counter. Unlike her assassin partner, she was still sober.  _Good_ , Steve thought. He wasn't sure he could deal with tipsy or drunk people right then.

"It's still her, isn't it?" she asked outright.

He sighed his answer and emptied his glass. Pivoting to face her, he barely registered that she was wearing a color other than black, white, or red. If he hadn't been so absorbed in his own wretched despair, he would have mentioned how the gold of her dress complimented her hair.

"Either let it go and move on," she advised, "or fix it. Your choice."

"Nat, it's not that simple."

"It is. You're no good to the team in this state. And don't think we haven't noticed."

He groaned and set his forehead forcefully against the heel of his palm. "Has Tony been making a fuss?"

"No, but it won't be long until he will."

He sighed again and reached for his freshly filled glass. "Just...don't let him say anything to Fury. Please."

She stood and backed away. "Fury knows too. He keeps tabs remember?"

Steve nodded, just as miserable as before. "Yeah, I know."

"And Steve?" She waited until he was looking at her to finish. "Enjoy yourself. It's Christmas after all."

"I'll try. Merry Christmas, Nat."

"Merry Christmas," she replied with a tip of her head.

Later on, as he passed Pepper and Tony talking quietly in a corner, he heard Tony whisper something about Paris and included Steve's name. A few hazy sentences later, Tony distinctly complained that he wasn't allowed to tease or beat sense into Steve. "He's pining!" Pepper scolded. "You need to respect that. It's been months, yes, but he'll see sense soon. Just let him be, poor soul." Tony spoke again before Pepper nodded, "I'll round up the girls for an intervention tomorrow. I agree, it's gone on too long now."

Turning away, Steve left as quickly as he could.

Christmas morning, Steve was cornered at the kitchen counter by Pepper, Jane, and Natasha. He should have known this was coming after what he'd caught while eavesdropping the previous night, but he hadn't expected a barrage of womanly advice that flooded him for the next hour. When the deluge drained to a few last words from Pepper, Jane excused herself and Natasha encouraged Steve to his feet.

"Fix it," Pepper commanded. "Behaving like this, you'll get us all killed. We can't trust you anymore and we can't stand seeing you so miserable."

"What she needs is an overblown, sincere, mildly romantic gesture," Natasha added. "Simple enough. And we'll be helping you. This ends today."

After another two hours, sixteen pieces of paper, two pens, and lots of cursing, Steve had written a two page letter, pouring into crude words the most heartfelt apology he'd ever given. Natasha had found Antoinette's address and neatly written it on an envelope for him while Pepper kept him focused on his task.

At last, the letter was finished and he read it aloud for them both. It was shamefully honest and he felt chagrined that they should hear his thoughts in such a way, but if they thought it would work, he would trust them. Besides, what better help could he get than Pepper and Natasha?

It took only another ten minutes to hunt down the appropriate stamps and mail the letter. It was finished. What was done was done and he couldn't get it back.

At the counter in the bar, a bottle of beer for each of them, Steve stared down the women. "If this works, I owe you both an endless favor. If it doesn't, don't ever run an intervention for me again. Are we clear?"

The women smiled and nodded before clinking their bottles to his. "We're clear," Pepper assured him.


	23. Lettre

On the evening of December 30th, Antoinette devoted some time to the stack of mail on her little apartment desk. Holding an envelope cutter in her teeth, she released her hair from its tight bun and shook it out. "Better," she mumbled to herself. Her ribs began to ache after the first shuffled filtering of junk mail. This would be a long night, she decided after sorting and laying aside the letters from fans, friends, and dance companies.

While she brewed peppermint tea, she allowed her eyes to scan over the first letter. She set it aside in a pile she would promise to reply to the next day. Two cups of tea later, she reached the last envelope in the stack. Too many stamps to be from France, not the kind she would see from Canada or Russia, and not enough to be from England. America then.

Who in America would want to speak to her via letter? Someone old-fashioned, or inept at technology...or both. Steve. Checking the return address, she became certain of it. The neat script read 'Stark Tower'... Manhattan, New York City, New York.

For a moment, she debated opening the letter. Was it even worth reading? She had forgotten about much of those disastrous few months and had recently wondered if Steve had forgotten too. Maybe it was worth it to read, maybe she could just read it and ignore it. Of their own accord, her hands tore open the envelope and revealed the neatly folded pages.

What was she doing? By the time her eyes had begun to read, her hands had gripped the margins and started to shake. He'd almost gotten her killed. Steve had allowed those men to drag her from the catacombs to the streets, allowed them to haul her off and kill her. And they had almost succeeded.

She'd trusted him with her life! She'd trusted him to keep her safe and to protect her....to keep her close. She'd felt unnaturally fond of Steve, and it broke her heart to know that everything she'd thought was real and meaningful- it was all a lie. Everything he'd told her was a lie or a broken promise. Could she believe anything he had to say even in this letter?

_Dear Antoinette,_

_Please hear me out. I know you don't want to, but I'm begging you to listen. After you've read this letter, then feel free to crumple it, shred it, burn it, do whatever. But at that point, you'll know the whole truth._

She had already begun to ball it up in her fist, but stopped. The truth. Her curiosity got the better of her and she read on.

_Everything I told you was true, just not the entire truth. At first, I withheld the information to protect you, to make my mission easier, and to allow you valid escape of any interrogation you might go through. But as time progressed, I became selfish. I still wanted to protect you, not as a witness or as a mission, but as a friend. I thought that if you knew that I was Captain America and of my work for SHIELD, especially the mission concerning you, you would hate me. I guess that all backfired. Now I've lost your friendship and your trust, and I'm sorry._

_You deserve to know the truth, so here it is. My name is Steven Rogers, but the world knows me as Captain America. I was born on July 4, 19_ _18_ _, and my dad really did die in the war- "the war" being WWI. My mom died from pneumonia, and I really did become an arts student in college after her death. America joined WWII and the rest is history until a few years ago when SHIELD thawed me out and introduced me to the new world. I never lied when I told you I was a soldier before becoming part of SHIELD. My mission initially was not to protect you; I was supposed to get information out of you. After I saw the danger you were in at the matinée, I couldn't do it. I wanted to keep you safe, and it didn't seem right to wring knowledge out of you- the very knowledge that was putting you in somebody's crosshairs. I couldn't do it. At that time, telling you everything would have endangered and prolonged the mission. The extra facts seemed irrelevant._

_Then during the two weeks you stayed with me, I got attached. I no longer saw you as a mission, but as a friend, something I have precious few of that still live. I made so many promises, broke most of them, continued to hold back the whole truth, and thought that you wouldn't hate me. How wrong I was. And Antoinette, I can't put into words how sorry I am. On that bridge in Nice, I battled telling you the truth. The whole truth. Everything. It almost slipped out. Then you reached for my hand, and I couldn't make myself do it. I was too attached to you and couldn't bear to lose you if that was what happened once you knew._

_What happened in the catacombs was inexcusable on my part and again, I'm very sorry. I thought you understood that I was bluffing. I would never let those men take you, Antoinette. You still might not believe me, and I don't blame you. I wouldn't believe me either from your point of view. But that's the solid truth: I never intended for you to get hurt. If only I'd been faster or wiser, I could have saved you, I thought. But he only would have hurt you that much sooner and I would still have been the cause._

The last sentence had been written in a shaky, unsure hand so that some letters looked deflated and others drifted haphazardly over their neighbors. Only strong emotion could shake the hand of a soldier, and she found herself believing him. Her stubbornness melted in the way that an ice cube melts clutched in a warm hand. Why hadn't she believed him sooner? Why had she overreacted? What did it matter if he was Captain America? What would she have done if he had told her the truth? Would she have understood? Would she have treated him any differently?

_I promised you the whole truth, and I will keep that promise if it happens to be the only promise I can keep. At the hospital, I waited a day to see you, and another day to talk to you. I was going to tell you everything. But you didn't want to hear anything I said, so I left. To be the cause of your pain and distress, and to know exactly what I should have done to prevent it, ate at my conscience and eroded at my peace of mind. I know you didn't want to hear me say this, but I knew there was a chance you would read it. Whether you actually made it this far without burning, tearing, or crumpling, I might never know._

_Antoinette, now that you know the truth, I understand if you cannot forgive me. I understand that sometimes pain and hurt as deep as what I've caused you can't be forgiven. But I am asking you- as sincerely as I humanly am capable- to forgive me for what I've said and not said, done and not done; for the pain I've inflicted upon you both directly and indirectly; for whatever problems I've placed on your dancing career; and for destroying your trust. I can't express how sorry I am. If I could go back and tell you the truth from the beginning, I would, but of all the technology today, time travel remains elusive. Please forgive me, Antoinette. If you can't, I understand, and I'm sorry. If you do forgive me, enclosed is a ticket for a  flight that leaves from Paris and will land in New York on January 1st. I would like very much to see you again and hope you accept this offer._

_Sincerely,_   
_Steven Rogers_

Why did she read it? Why did she read any of it? She groaned and slid down to sit on the floor, clutching the empty mug in her hand. Now she felt compelled to either burn the letter or pack her bags and meet him in New York. Which should she do? Both were viable possibilities; she was capable of both. But what was right? Should she save herself the bitter pain and just burn the letter? Would she regret going to America and seeing him? If she did fly to New York, would she be happy? Would she want to fly home again?

Would she be able to forgive him for tearing a rift in her life? Her ballet had been put on hold for months so she could heal. How could she forgive that? She'd been so depressed and upset for weeks until she could return to practices.

If she did forgive him, was the emotional pain worth it? What if their relationship couldn't be healed? She knew that to see Steve again would open old wounds and make her bleed out multiple times over again. It would be like pulling splinters- an act that caused pain to allow healing. Her mental and emotional wounds had long since scabbed over, but was she willing to let them bleed to give them a chance to heal?

After fighting an inner war for the better part of an hour, she crawled to the sink and set her mug inside. What was she doing? she wondered as she dragged her suitcase out of the closet. Shaking her head, she began to throw her clothes into the space.


	24. Clémence

Jitters. Steve could feel only jitters. His eyes shifted to the direction of every sudden noise, every loud voice, every foreign language. Around him, everything was alive. The air was charged with intangible electricity as well as the metallic blue shocks he received every time someone bumped his shoulders. Curse this dry weather, he thought. But at least Antoinette would have good weather to fly in. No storms, no squalls, no scares- just smooth skies from Paris to Port Washington. At least...for the time being. He'd seen in the newspaper and on the news that a storm was moving quickly from the Midwest to New York. Still, no inclement weather impeded flights from across the Atlantic.

Steve had spent much of the late morning at the airport, waiting, pacing, worrying, and waiting more. When? When would her flight land? Where? Where would he lay eyes on her for the first time since she had cursed him from the hospital? Would she be there at all? Would she accept his apology? What would she say? Would she speak to him? Would she be afraid? Angry? Aloof?

He could only worry...and wait.

The discordant smells and sounds of the airport infiltrated his brain, intoxicated his senses, inundated his thinking and reasoning. Constantly, he wavered between worrying over Antoinette and worrying over the city. Attacks had become frequent. No longer were the Avengers handling battles the government couldn't fight, but also major fires and emergencies. What heroes would they be if they spent half their time sitting around? The warbling of an Italian woman calling for her grandchildren distracted him, but didn't hold his attention for long. From his right, a ski team sliced their way through the crowd, carrying their bagged skis over their shoulders. In their wake, an Asian family with cameras around their necks elbowed toward the restrooms.

Life. So much life and energy. It surged in the cavernous airport, rebounded along the tiled floors, and teased the jet-lagged minds fighting just to call a cab. But Steve felt dead. His hands were as still as he had been trained to keep them. His weight did not shift foot to foot or heel to toe in nervousness. His eyes did not leave the window. With the concentration of a hunter, a sniper, a bombardier, he did not waver from his vigil. Hours passed and his feet did not move but to trace the path to the restroom and back again to the window. He refused to sit. No, he would rather wait with as much attentiveness as Penelope waited for Odysseus to return from his absence at war. Antoinette had been fighting a war of her own, and Steve was left to wait, wondering if she would return at all, or if his patience was in vain.

As he stared out the large windows, a plane began to taxi toward the empty runway. It halted, turned, began to crawl forward, gaining speed and momentum until the wings strained to lift the craft. With a graceful tilt, it rose into the air and disappeared into the grey sky. The wake of disturbed air behind it stirred heaps of glittering, powdery snow into whirls, sparkling in the weak sunlight, dancing over the asphalt. Like raging waves on the North Sea, the snow spun into the air, crashed back to the earth, only to be caught again and swept in undulating ripples toward the miniature workers in blue uniforms. The snow teased the bland, iron-colored surroundings with its purity and dazzling whiteness. It laughed, played, danced- danced with the exuberance he had seen on the stage when Antoinette performed.

Antoinette. If she was coming at all, she would be there soon. The screen behind Steve displayed a chart of dizzying colors and names, cities, flight numbers, and times. Some rows were red to designate cancellations, others were yellow to indicate delays. Paris to New York was still blue. Where was she? On the plane? On the ground? On stage in Paris, practicing until her thoughts were consumed wholly with ballet?

Steve was unaware that she stood in the terminal exit at the far end of the room. Her petite frame was hidden behind families, business partners, sports teams, travel bloggers, and the occasional lone tourist. When she hefted her backpack onto her shoulder, the action seemed to set her feet in motion. She had decided to come. There was no turning back.

Steve saw a new flood of people looking to pass through the place where he stood, so he backed up until he felt the residual cold of the window against the back of his head. Mothers held hands with their children, wives held hands with husbands, friends held onto each others' backpack straps so not to be separated. While he watched, the clock turned to read 3:30pm, and the row for Paris to New York disappeared. This was it. Antoinette was here or she wasn't. He had to find out.

Stretching her neck, Antoinette fought futilely to see above the crowd. For once, she hated being so short, hated being so petite, and hated being so quiet. Why was she cursed with this predicament? Her only solution seemed to be standing on the plastic chairs that were bolted to the floor in endless rows leading to baggage claim. Maybe she should get her bags first, then find St- Captain Rogers. That was who he was, and she would address him appropriately. She had accepted his apology, but that didn't mean they were friends. How could they be? He was Captain America, a war hero, a science experiment, the star-spangled face of America's hopes and dreams. Antoinette was just a Parisian ballerina.  _Non_ , they could not be friends. 

Dropping her bags on a chair, she stepped onto the flimsy blue plastic and stood  _en demi pointe_  to see over the heads of the crowd. The mob was roughly half male, but only a fraction had blond hair. Frantically, her eyes searched for the captain, trying to pick out blond hair, blue eyes, and broad shoulders. Could he already be at baggage claim? Waiting for her? Wanting to see her? Wishing he hadn't come? Wanting to repeal his offer? Waiting to send her back to France?

Behind her, a woman carrying two dozing toddlers on her hips jostled the seat, causing Antoinette to lose her balance and step down to avoid falling. No sign of Captain Rogers. She would just have to collect her bags first and find him after. Or she could take a taxi to the tower and wait for him there. Maybe he wasn't at the airport? Maybe he had a ride arranged that didn't include being there to welcome her? Maybe he was losing his old-fashioned chivalry and letting her learn independence in a foreign city.  _Non_ , the captain was too kind to do that. She knew him well enough to be certain that he wouldn't consider leaving anyone, and especially not someone he invited, at a strange airport, in a foreign country, in a terrifying city, alone. He was here, and she knew it. Finding him would be the hard part.

Steve meandered through the crowd, excusing himself to anyone who spoke English, and apologizing with hand gestures when necessary. It seemed everyone and his uncle's cousin had flown home for the end of the holidays, packing the airport and causing bedlam. Baggage claim conveyor belts were slow, someone's bag was crushed, a woman's umbrella was broken; a man with a mustache more expressive than a German opera singer shouted at the information desk attendee until the attendee looked as if he wanted to curl up behind the desk and never return. The mustache quivered, collecting stray spit that flew toward the attendee. Around the matted grey whiskers, the man's skin was turning purple, beginning at his shirt collar and climbing toward his receding hairline. This man's wide girth barred the only space that led to where Antoinette could be waiting. If he got around this man, he had a greater chance of finding the petite ballerina. As he tried squeezing between duffel bags and briefcases, folded strollers, large suitcases with extendable handles that acted like turnstiles, and backpacks at every height, he barely slipped through to the calmer side of the baggage claim.

Antoinette's mood about her height swung like a pendulum when she was easily able to dodge families and couples, children, grandparents with canes, and herds of teenage cousins. Passing a large man with a thick mustache, she found herself engulfed in the pure chaos of holiday airport foot traffic. Welcome to New York City, she groaned inwardly. Population, higher than that of many small European countries.  _Tres magnifique._

On the busier side of the airport, Steve found himself gridlocked. He could not move forward without banging his shins on chairs, luggage, pet carriers, or walking sticks. To his back, a family of seven young ladies ranging from early college age to middle school age had barricaded the return path to the window with colorful suitcases, each with a ribbon in extravagant colors tied to the handle. As he pivoted, his eyes searching above the heads of the crowd, the sixth sense the war had cultivated in him- the sense that something was wrong, askew, off-kilter- began to raise its ugly head.

BANG

Voices ceased. People froze. All seven ladies yelped. Mothers instinctively grabbed their children. Children began to cry. Around him, the craziness that had been raging earlier abruptly stopped, then became chaos. Loud, manic, intense, panicked. The press of people thickened as everyone began to shove their way out of baggage claim. Smoke billowed from a conveyor belt and a sheet of metal fell to the floor with a  _clash_. Gears ground together in the gap. In the dark chute, bags began to pile up, blocked by another sheet of metal that had bent up and jammed on the curve.

Leaping over a line of chairs, dodging a young couple comforting their children, ducking past people running out of the airport, Steve raced to the conveyor belt. Smoke filled the air, but there was no fire or sign of explosion. Just a malfunction. Not a bomb. Not a grenade. Not an act of war. 

When he turned around, a team of TSA agents had converged at the scene, but Steve barely saw them. He'd spotted a blonde braid disappearing into the retreating crowd. "It's okay. Just a mechanical problem," he assured the agents. When he tried stepping forward, no one moved out of his way. "Excuse me. Excuse me, I'm meeting someone. Please, let me through." When he stepped forward, still no one moved. Instead, the agents began questioning him. Steve answered as quickly as he could and did not wait to be dismissed. He had waited too long to see Antoinette and he wasn't about to let TSA agents stand in his way. 

Excusing himself further, he escaped, already struggling to find the blonde braid he had seen earlier. Where had she gone? Surely she wouldn't leave without him? Did she know he was there? Did she think he wouldn't come for her? His questions were put to rest when he spotted a luggage case tagged with a Paris to New York sticker. The hand resting on the bag was relaxed, but poised to move, the fingers loosely securing the case's handle. The neatly trimmed and shaped nails were painted a pale, flat pink. As he neared enough to make out more details, the hand pushed blonde hair away from chilling blue eyes, as cold as broken ice. 

Should he call to her? Would she run? Would she curse at him? Even worse, would she refuse to speak to him at all?

Parting his lips, expanding his lungs, preparing to say her name, he was interrupted when she turned her head. Antoinette's mouth opened, her eyes widened, her whole petite frame faced him with an expression of shock. She spoke first. "Steve?" Her voice quavered. As always when her emotions ran high, her accent thickened. 

"I'm so sorry," he began, finally reaching her. "I should have told you the truth from the beginning, and Antoinette, I am so, so sorry."

Faintly, she smiled and shifted her weight toward him. " _C'est d'accord._  I forgive you."

"How? I lied to you. I got you stabbed. You could have died and it would have been my fault."

She shook her head and let pieces of hair fall into her eyes as the ice melted out of them. "You apologized. You are sorry. I see no way I could not forgive you. To hold a grudge makes one bitter, and bitterness ruins lives."

Steve finally smiled, feeling a waterfall of relief purge the weight of guilt and repentance from him. "Thank you."

" _Ce n'est pas grave_. But, if it is a possibility, can we leave? I am exhausted, and ze noise..."

Nodding, Steve took her bags for her. "Of course." He led her outside, through the parking garage, and to a small black car with a SHIELD logo on the license plate. Opening the door for her, Steve watched her slide into the shotgun seat. " _Merci_ ," she nearly whispered, her soft voice echoing in the concrete structure. After stowing her bags in the back, he joined her in the front, turning the ignition and switching on the headlights. 

On their way to the tower, Antoinette fought to keep her eyes open. "If you need a nap, you'll have about thirty minutes," he told her, glancing over at her briefly. He glimpsed her nod and lean against the window where city lights passed in gold and red blurs on a black-blue background. "Welcome to New York," he said quietly, finally feeling a sense of peace come over them. They could finally start healing.


	25. Fin

After a week at Avengers tower, Antoinette and Natasha became good friends. It seemed that any time Clint or Steve walked into the kitchen when both girls were present, they were caught in laughter or deep conversation, often with one or the other stretching with one foot propped on the countertop. And when they wanted to talk when the men were in the room, Natasha and Antoinette would slip in and out of French. Eventually, Antoinette had to leave as the ballet traveled the States. 

Steve helped her carry her luggage to the door of the Tower. "You will keep in touch,  _oui_?" she asked, turning to face him. Already, she was standing  _en demipointe_ , a sign of her eagerness to leave and begin dancing again. 

"As much as I can," he promised.  

She hesitated before replying, " _Bon_ ," the word clipped by her tongue. Before Steve could say anything, she rose  _en pointe_  and kissed his cheek. "Don't pine too much. I'll be back before you know it." She winked, then grasped the handle of her luggage and left. Steve waved as she walked away, a little schoolboy smile starting to curl his lips.

Steve endured a two-hour lesson on how to operate an email account just to keep in touch with Antoinette while she was away. After three months of regular conversation, he received a hastily typed message. 

 _Bonjour Steve,_  
The ballet and troupe are returnin to Nouveau York in two weeks. We have seen successes at many shows and invitation to travel again next year was extended! Our final performance will show in New York and the troupe will leave for Paris the next morning. Would M. Stark allow me stay at the Tower? After the recent events in France, it would be unwise and unsafe for me to leave with them. I would like very much to stay in this city and audition for a dance company here. If thi s a possibility, please let me know at the soonest opportunity.   
Yours always,   
Antoinette

Unable to keep a smile off his face, Steve typed his reply. 

 _Bonjour Antoinette,_  
I am glad to hear of the ballet's success these past months! Tony has been away and I don't know when he'll return, but I'm sure he wouldn't have any objections if you stayed with us. The room you were staying in before has been left empty in case you'd like to stay there. I look forward to seeing you again.   
Steve

Two weeks seemed to drag into eternity. The Thursday before Antoinette was to return to New York, Steve was approached by Fury and assigned a mission. "How long will I be away?" he asked. 

Regarding him with one eye, Fury snorted a laugh. "As long as it takes for you to finish. If it takes a day, then a day. If it takes a week, it takes a week. Get it done."

"Yes, sir." Steve shook his head, but accepted the file. He just had to focus and finish. Focusing was much easier than it sounded. He had no struggles with carrying out the orders given to him, but finding the various locations he needed to be at manifested itself in shouting at the GPS and missing every other left turn. The more directions he confuddled, the more frustrated he became at himself, the more distracted he felt, the more he missed the turn he should have taken. 

The day Antoinette was meant to return passed, and Steve found himself in Texas, watching as a herd of brown cows crossed the road. Dust stirred by thousands of hooves filled the air like lazy clouds that had drifted too close to earth. Impatiently, Steve tapped his fingers against the handles of his motorcycle. Two more targets and he could return to New York. Just two. But only if these cows got across the road before Christmas! 

Hot May sun seared the back of his neck and caused sweat to soak his hair until his helmet felt sticky and uncomfortable. Dang cows. Finally, a rider on a horse brought up the rear of the herd and waved for Steve to continue. 

With the target in Dallas taken care of, he moved on to the target in Charleston, South Carolina. Curse this mission, he thought as he crouched on a rooftop. Not that hiding would do him that much good. Gazing down, he noticed the layout of the streets. Just another difference between modern, ever-changing America and the steadfast European beauty of Paris. Unbidden, he recalled a night on the coast, leaning with his elbows on the side of a bridge, Antoinette beside him. Her skirt got caught in the breeze, but she didn't seem to mind. Lights in the city, lights lining the roads, lights reflected on the water. A purple sunset and a velvety night sky over the Mediterranean. He could almost hear the soothing sound of the tide, like the ocean inhaling and exhaling, and with every exhale, pushing foam onto the white sand.

He was so lost in memory that he almost didn't feel a bullet ricochet off a metal roof and graze his arm. Almost. In an instant, he had raised his shield and heard another muffled gun shot. Whoever was shooting was using a silencer. Wise, he thought. So they don't want to cause panic.

Tracing the path of the bullet backwards, he glimpsed the black uniform of the shooter. Without thinking, Steve leapt off the roof and raced across the next. He tucked his legs close to his body and rolled through an open window. The shooter couldn't get the evidence of his mission packed fast enough. With one hit from his shield, he watched the man slump to the ground. Target finished. He found a heavy piece of furniture to place across the man's chest to pin him long enough for the police to come. 

Finished, Steve made his way to the nearest SHIELD base and caught a Quinjet back to New York. Antoinette had been in the city for an entire week by this time. An entire week he hadn't heard from her and hadn't been able to contact her either. How was she doing? Had the ballet gone well? Had she been disappointed he couldn't be there? Surely someone had explained his situation to her? Would she act as cold and aloof as she had in France?

His fears were dispelled when he arrived in the lounge and was greeted by cheers, laughter, and a glass of Tony's best scotch. "What are we celebrating?" he asked, certain it wasn't his arrival. "You guys are never this happy to see me."

"Oh, it's not you we care about," Natasha laughed, raising her own glass of scotch. "Tony would kill us if we opened this bottle for you."

"Naw, this is for Antoinette," Clint chimed in. "Why don't you tell him?" He smiled and gestured with the one arm not supporting his reclining frame. Between him and Thor, and appearing dwarfed beside the Asgardian, Antoinette set down her drink and rushed to give Steve a hug. 

"Hey, it's good to see you again. How did it go? Your last performance, huh?"

She shook her head, blonde hair flying. "Not at all! I 'ave audition for ze American Ballet Theatre! Zey need a principle dancer, and a turner, and I am both  _et je ne peux pas croire qu'ils demanderaient pour moi, mais ils ont vu la performance et m'a demandé en personne, il au théâtre d'auditionner pour eux! C'est demain!"_

Steve understood enough to congratulate her and return the hug. "That's great!"

"Well, don't just stand there," Clint scoffed. "Come celebrate!"

 

The night continued in laughter, games, jokes, and plenty of Tony's good scotch. By the time the clocks displayed past midnight, Banner and Thor had left and Clint was too drunk to string two words together. Natasha excused herself and Clint, dragging him off the couch with plenty of threats and Russian curses. Now alone, Steve faced Antoinette. "I'm sorry I couldn't be here to welcome you back-"

"It is your job." She interrupted with a nod and a tired smile. "I understand. And I am 'appy you are safe."

"Thank you. Still, I'd like to make it up to you somehow. Maybe we could go sightseeing together after your audition?"

"Zat is not necessary," she said, shaking her head. "I would love to sight see with you, but you do not 'ave to make it up to me."

"I insist."

"If you are that stubborn, then there is something you can do."

"Anything," he replied, easily.

"Will you dance with me?"

Steve hesitated. He had never danced before. Hadn't he told Peggy- Peggy. He had promised Peggy she could teach him to dance. It was too late for that now. After so many years, after decades of waiting, wishing, regretting, and reliving old memories, maybe...maybe he could find a new dance partner. Maybe it was time he let go of the forties and embraced this crazy century. 

"I've never danced before," he warned her.

"Zat is okay. I will teach you." Antoinette stood and took his large hand in both her smaller hands. 

Nodding, Steve let her pull him to his feet. "Okay. But I'm apologizing now if I step on your toes."

She giggled and led him to an open space in the lounge where they would have room to dance. Jarvis- that sneaky robot- changed the music playing to something soft and lilting. "You place your hands..." She set both of his hands on her waist. "And I..." Both of her hands reached up to his shoulders. "Start with your right foot."

After a pause to match the music, they stepped together. The first few minutes were a bit awkward, but once Steve got the hang of it, Antoinette could look up from her feet without worrying about her toes. Laying her head on his chest, she closed her eyes and relaxed. He could feel her breathing slow down as they turned and swayed. Too soon, the song ended and she lifted her head. For some reason, Steve didn't want to let go just yet. "Hey, Jarvis, play us another like that. I think I need more practice." 

Briefly, Antoinette tilted her head to look at him. "You are da- ahhhh, yes, more practice would be nice." With a nymphean smirk, she nodded. " _Oui._ Anotherslow song,  _s'il te plait_."

Again, they danced in the peaceful atmosphere, uninterrupted by worries, missions, or past mistakes. This time, when the music faded and Antoinette raised her eyes to Steve's, he didn't hesitate to bend and gently kiss her. 

When he straightened, he realized Antoinette was smiling in a way he'd never seen before. Not triumphantly like after a good performance, or jovially like after Clint told a joke, but blissfully. "I think," she whispered. "I like New York."

I do too, he decided. And for once, he wasn't imagining the Brooklyn of the forties, but the Manhattan outside the windows, a city he finally felt comfortable calling 'home'.


End file.
